.
News in English until 11th September, 2015
For more recent news, go to: https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com/en-ingles-2/
.
*************
.
The Young Indigenous From Bachajón, Who Allege Torture During Their Detention, are Free
By Aldabi Olvera
Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN), were released on Tuesday 18th August from Cereso 12 in Yajalón, Chiapas, in compliance with amparo 1456/2014 in which it is recognized that their rights were violated when they were arrested.
The three young Tseltales from Bachajón (none over 24 years old) were captured in the early morning of September 16, 2014. The same police officers who arrested the youths asserted that the youths attempted to murder them [the police], which was never proved.
In the resolution of the amparo, of which Más de 131 obtained a copy, we read that the agents did not fulfil “their obligation” to put the detainees immediately under ministerial authority, as required by the law, but presented them 9 hours later.
“Especially since the complainants argue that the Municipal Police of Chilon, Chiapas, inflicted acts of torture on them in order to incriminate them” says the text of the resolution issued in the First District Court of Coatzacoalcos, Veracruz.
And it continues:
“It did not pass unnoticed by the undersigned that in the ministerial procedure of September 16, 2014, the investigating prosecutor gave evidence of the injuries to the physical integrity of the accused”.
This reporter visited the three indigenous a few days after they were arrested. During a talk that lasted two hours, they gave their testimony in Tseltal. Their faces showed severe bumps and scrapes.
As Más de 131 has documented on several occasions, the Tseltal indigenous adherents to the Sixth fear that, in the area around the waterfalls of Agua Azul, which are adjacent to their territory, a tourist resort complex is being set up which will gradually displace them. Since they began their struggle, the adherents to the Sixth have suffered the murders of two of their spokespeople: Juan Vázquez Guzmán (2012) and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano (2013).
The adherents still have three other prisoners: Esteban Gómez Jiménez, Santiago Moreno Pérez and Emilio Jiménez Gómez.
In the communiqué, the Tseltales also condemn the release of Carmelino Rodríguez Jiménez and Javier López Rodríguez, belonging to the CIOAC-H and imprisoned for the murder of the Zapatista votán José Luis Solís, “Galeano”, in 2014.
@Aldabi
.
.
Communiqué From San Sebastián Bachajón 19th August 2015
Three Tseltal indigenous, Juan Antonio Gomez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gomez Hernandez, political prisoners from San Sebastian Bachajón, are released following an amparo recognising their illegal detention and torture.
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 19th AUGUST 2015
To the Clandestine Indigenous Revolutionary Committee – General Command of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
The compañeros political prisoners of San Sebastian Bachajon, Juan Antonio Gomez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gomez Hernandez, prisoners in (Cereso # 12) Yajalón Chiapas, were released from prison on Tuesday, August 18th of this year in compliance with an amparo recognising the illegal detention and torture of our compañeros; likewise we demand freedom for the others imprisoned unjustly, Esteban Gomez Jimenez, prisoner in Cintalapa de Figueroa (Amate # 14), and Santiago Moreno Perez and Emilio Jimenez Gomez, prisoners in Playas de Catazajá, Chiapas (Cereso # 17) and the freedom of other prisoners in Mexico and the world.
Immediate freedom for the unjustly imprisoned defenders of the water from the Yaqui tribe, Mario Luna and Fernando Jimenez, and in general for all the political prisoners in the country.
We hold the bad government, and the state and federal forces responsible for recent developments in the community of Santa Maria Ostula. Last July 19th federal forces entered the community of Santa Maria, opening fire and shooting to kill at unarmed civilians, killing a child, Edilberto Reyes Garcia, 12 years of age. Prior to this act of homicide, they arrested compañero Cemei Zepeda Verdia, who was appointed by his community as first general commander of Santa Maria Ostula.
We denounce those who are responsible for the release of two of the intellectual authors of the murder of the teacher and compañero Galeano; the self-proclaimed “judge” Victor Manuel Zepeda López, of the criminal court in Comitán de Domínguez, Chiapas, declared that Mr. Carmelino Rodríguez Jiménez and Mr. Javier López Rodríguez are innocent, despite that fact that they and their accomplices in the CIOAC-Histórica know that they are guilty of organizing the crime.
Compañeros and compañeras, we want to say to the indigenous Otomí community of San Francisco Xochicuautla, municipality of Lerma in the state of Mexico, that you are not alone because we are attentive to your struggle, it enrages us how the accursed government wants to take away your lands with violence and repression just like they want to take away our lands in San Sebastian Bachajón, we ask the compañeros and compañeras from Mexico and the world that, according to their times and ways of being, they raise their voices for San Francisco Xochicuautla in these important moments in the struggle for the defence of their land and sacred sites, which the bad government wants to destroy in order to build highways without considering nature.
Justice for the compañeros and compañeras killed for defending freedom, peace and life.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas, Mexico, we send an embrace and combative greetings from the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón.
Never again a Mexico without us
Land and Freedom
Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the disappeared compañeros from Ayotzinapa!
Long live the dignified struggle of our compañeros y compañeras from the ejido Tila!
JUSTICE FOR AYOTZINAPA, ACTEAL, ABC, ATENCO!
.
.
Chiapas “The Other Prisoners.”
Chiapas, Mexico, 14th July. “They imprisoned me for organising myself and for defending the mother earth,” reiterates the indigenous Tseltal Esteban Gómez Jiménez, far from the limelight now occupied by the escape of the “most wanted” drug trafficker in the world. The imprisonment of Esteban and his compañeros from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón is evidence of the methods that are valued by officials from the three levels, to “boost the tourism-based economy in the jungle area of Chiapas,” at the cost of dispossessing the indigenous peoples, as the ““Grupo de Trabajo No Estamos todos” (GTNET), dedicated to the support of political prisoners, has been denouncing.
“I have been a prisoner since 2012, I am accused of assault and the possession of weapons and murder, I was detained at a village called PAMALÁ, where I was chopping firewood and I was moved to cereso no. 17 in Playas de Catazaja, where I spent one year eight months, then I was moved to cereso no. 14 “EL AMATE” in Cintalapa de Figueroa, Chiapas,” said Gómez Jiménez, in whose ejido, adherent to the Sexta, are situated the touristic Agua Azul Waterfalls, where there are plans to build hotels costing more than 10 thousand pesos a night.
In March 2008, GTNET explains, the companies Norton Consulting Inc. and EDSA Construction, following the Mesoamerican Project (PPP,) presented the proposal to “boost the economy based on tourism in the jungle area of Chiapas.” The study aimed to develop a strategic plan that identifies the areas and projects which can improve what is on offer to tourists, with “More and more visitors spending” in what will be the Integrally Planned Centre – Agua Azul Waterfalls (CIP-CAA).
The first stage of CIP-CAA will be developing a hotel chain to manage the “Lodge/retreat” concept and make the Agua Azul waterfalls one of “the most special resort experiences that exist in the Western Hemisphere,” operating four concepts of hotels/resorts in which the most luxurious chains in global tourism will invest: World Class Boutique Hotel, Lodge/retreat – near the Agua Azul waterfalls, European style five-star hotel, and resort with hotel, conference and Golf centre, adds GTNET.
The operators being considered for investment are: Luxury Collection, Orient Express, and Aman, who all operate a room rate of $300 to $1000 a night (3800-10800 pesos). The outstanding European hotels include Sonesta, Barcelo, Sol Melia, and Kempinsky. For hotel, conference and Golf centre: Camino Real, Posadas, Park, Royal, Marriott, Hyatt and Westin.
“I am innocent, I call on you to help me gain my freedom. I call on national and international solidarity for my release, they imprisoned me for organising myself and for defending the mother earth,” emphasizes Esteban in his latest communiqué on 13th July.
.
.
Communiqué From San Sebastián Bachajón In Solidarity With San Francisco Xochicuautla
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 12th JULY 2015
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To the collectives and committees of solidarity at a national and international level
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras, we express our solidarity with the indigenous Otomí community of San Francisco Xochicuautla, municipality of Lerma in the State of Mexico, which is fighting in defence of Mother Earth threatened by the bad government of Enrique Peña Nieto, where a few days ago a decree was published for the expropriation of 37 hectares of land to build a highway in the State of Mexico for the benefit of their friend the businessman Cantu Hinojosa, regardless of the destruction of mother nature, the trees, the water, and the sacred sites of our compañeros and compañeras.
We want to say to the community of San Francisco Xochicuautla that you are not alone, compañeros and compañeras, because we are watching your struggle, it makes us angry that the bloody government wants to take away their land with violence and repression, for they also wants to take away our land of San Sebastián Bachajón.
We ask the compañeros and compañeras of Mexico and the world that in their times and ways they raise their voices for San Francisco Xochicuautla in these important moments in the struggle for the defence of their territories and sacred sites.
We demand the liberation of our prisoners in Yajalón JUAN ANTONIO GOMEZ SILVANO, MARIO AGUILAR SILVANO and ROBERTO GOMEZ HERNANDEZ; prisoners in Playas de Catazajá SANTIAGO MORENO PERES, EMILIO JIMENES GOMEZ; prisoner in Amate ESTEBAN GOMEZ JIMENEZ.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas, Mexico, we send an embrace and combative greetings from the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón.
Never again a Mexico without us
Land and Freedom
Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Antonio Vivar Diaz lives
NO dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the disappeared compañeros from Ayotzinapa!
Long live the dignified struggle of our Chol compañeros y compañeras from the ejido Tila!
JUSTICE FOR AYOTZINAPA, ACTEAL, ABC, ATENCO!
.
.
Judge Recognises That There Are Reasons To Consider Torture By Municipal Police Of Prisoners From San Sebastian Bachajón, Chiapas
Desinformémonos
July 10. On 16th September, 2014, municipal police arrested Juan Antonio Gómez, Mario Aguilar and Roberto Gómez, who they tortured and held for nine hours or so before handing them over to the Public Ministry in Ocosingo, where the graduate Rodolfo Gómez Gutiérrez put a gun to, and a bag over, the head of Mario Aguilar Silvano.
Read Constitutional Judgment [1]
A judge has granted an amparo [order for legal protection] in favour of Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández from the community of San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, who have been held in prison in Yajalón since September 2014. “The judgement of amparo recognized that for nine hours the indigenous were deprived of their liberty and warns that there are elements to consider and that the torture must be investigated. The criminal judge must issue a new writ of constitutional term, which defines whether they are free or the subject of criminal proceedings,” informed the defence lawyer Ricardo Lagunes.
The Bachajón ejidatarios stated at the time that the imprisonment of their compañeros was the result of retaliation from the municipal police and judicial authorities for the imprisonment of a member of the Ocosingo municipal police accused of involvement in the murder of Juan Gómez Silvano, brother of one of the prisoners.
On 16th September, 2014, municipal police arrested Juan Antonio Gómez, Mario Aguilar and Roberto Gómez, who they tortured and held for nine hours or so before handing them over to the Public Ministry in Ocosingo, where the graduate Rodolfo Gómez Gutiérrez put a gun to, and a bag over, the head of Mario Aguilar Silvano.
After the arrest, explained Lagunes, the three indigenous appeared before a judge charged with causing injuries. The judge set bail of one million pesos for the three to be granted freedom, when the same charges normally result in bail of 10 thousand pesos.
“The judge of Ocosingo reclassified the crime of causing injuries as attempted murder and they were no longer entitled to bail. The case was reclassified with the same evidence as for injuries and without better arguments, and sets aside the medical evidence of torture,” said the lawyer Lagunes.
For the lawyer, the charges against the indigenous from Bachajón were constructed by the municipal police of Chilón, because they acted as judge and jury in the case. “We hope that the resolution by the criminal judge is settled before September, for they will then have been a year in detention; we are now waiting to see whether or not the Federal Public Ministry (MPF) imposes an appeal against the amparo.”
The judge who issued the amparo advised the criminal judge to consider that the detention was made in conditions which violated human rights and that they should exclude all the evidence that has been obtained through torture.
“It is an amparo which will probably lead to the freedom of Juan Gomez, Mario Aguilar and Roberto Gomez because apart from the indications by the municipal police, there is no other evidence against them,” said Ricardo Lagunes in an interview with Desinformémonos.
If the MPF does not present an appeal for review, the judge from Yajalón should immediately redefine the legal status of the three indigenous, and the effect of the amparo would be more immediate and there would not be a second stage to prolong the criminal process and prevent modification, explained Lagunes.
For the lawyer defending the three inhabitants of San Sebastian Bachajón, the entire criminal process has been flawed from the beginning, the charge is sustained by torture and unilateral accusations, and the resort to amparo was the only real and effective way to defend them. “To face a criminal trial in circumstances of disadvantage and the violation of human rights, is to validate and legitimize the actions of the police.”
Now the prosecution can see that the detention has been prolonged and in violation of human rights, it should give them their freedom, said the lawyer Ricardo Lagunes, even more so if evidence of torture was presented. “Given the conflict in Bachajón and its political work, they do not hesitate to continue the proceedings despite independent evidence.”
The court in Ocosingo has not formalized any investigation into the case of torture, therefore the lawyer Lagunes filed a criminal complaint with the prosecutors, for public servants in Tuxtla Gutierrez to investigate, against the commander of the Municipal Police of Chilón because he was aware of what happened, against the staff of the public ministry that made the preliminary investigation, and against the police officers involved in the torture.
On 21st December last, ejidatarios from San Sebastian Bachajón recuperated the lands that were dispossessed from them in 2011, as well as the toll booth on the road to the Agua Azul waterfalls. The Ejido, one of the largest in Mexico, is of 70 thousand hectares, in an area of great biodiversity and natural beauty. The land is rich in natural resources, green rainforest, wildlife and water. The spectacular waterfalls of Agua Azul, famous for their turquoise colour in certain seasons, cascade in the nearby municipality of Tumbalá, but, in order to access the Ecotourism Centre there, it is necessary to cross the Bachajón ejido.
Article printed from Desinformémonos: http://desinformemonos.org.mx
URL to article: http://desinformemonos.org.mx/2015/07/73035/
[1] Read Constitutional Judgment: http://sise.cjf.gob.mx/SVP/word1.aspx?arch=372/03720000160035500041032.docx_1&sec=ROSA_ELENA_MOLINA_COELLO&svp=1
.
.
Bachajón Communiqué From Palenque, With The Parents Of The Disappeared From Ayotzinapa
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 18th JUNE 2015
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To the collectives and committees of solidarity at a national and international level
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras, today we walk in Palenque, Chiapas alongside the brave and dignified mothers and fathers of the compañeros forcibly disappeared from Ayotzinapa by this narco government which has hijacked the country and with its military and police only wants to govern the country to trample over us as if our lives were worth nothing.
The institutions of the bad government are rotten to their roots and there is no way to defend our right through the law of bad government, so we work for the autonomy of our peoples and obey the people so they can have a decent life, we organize ourselves so we can address the needs of the peoples; even though the government wants to see us without money and in poverty we continue to build our autonomy, we denouncing the machinations of the bad government and the crimes they have committed such as murder when they killed our compañeros who were authorities like Juan Vazquez Guzmán on 24th April 2013 and Juan Carlos Gomez Silvano on 21st March 2014.
There is no other way, compañeros and compañeras, we must organize and struggle to build another country where there is respect for the life of the peoples and respect for our rights.
We want to remember our compañeros y compañeras who were killed in the massacre at Viejo Velasco in November 13, 2006, where grave human rights violations were committed, and where also there are compañeros displaced for fighting for land as in Acteal where after many years there is still no justice. This is happening in Guerrero which fills us with pain and rage, knowing that there also there is no respect for life and the autonomy of the peoples. So the best justice is not to forget, to remember the compañeros and compañeras who have fought for a world where many worlds fit.
We demand the liberation of our prisoners in Yajalón JUAN ANTONIO GOMEZ SILVANO, MARIO AGUILAR SILVANO and ROBERTO GOMEZ HERNANDEZ, prisoners in Playas de Catazajá SANTIAGO MORNEO PERES, EMILIO JIMENES GOMEZ, prisoner in Amate ESTEBAN GOMEZ JIMENEZ.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas, Mexico, we send an embrace and combative greetings from the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón.
Never again a Mexico without us
Land and Freedom
Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Antonio Vivar Diaz lives
NO dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the disappeared compañeros from Ayotzinapa!
Long live the dignified struggle of our Chol compañeros y compañeras from the ejido Tila!
JUSTICE FOR AYOTZINAPA, ACTEAL, ABC, ATENCO!
.
.
Words Of Esteban Gómez, Unjustly Imprisoned, From San Sebastián Bachajón
To the national and international Sixth
To the compañeros of Movement for Justice in El Barrio from NY
A the free and alternative media
To political prisoners in Mexico
I am Esteban Gómez Jimenez, I am here in the centre for social reintegration of the sentenced no IV in el Amate in the Ejido Lazaro Cardenas, municipality of Cintalapa Figueroa.
They accused me of assault, of carrying a weapon, homicide (4 charges); I have now spent two years in prison, they put me in prison on 12th June but I am innocent, I call on you to help me to gain my freedom.
I call for national and international solidarity to help me achieve my freedom, I was imprisoned for organising and defending Mother Earth.
I greet all the political prisoners in the country.
I say goodbye and ask you to be attentive to my situation because I am unjustly imprisoned.
sincerely
Esteban Gomez Jimenez
–
Esteban Gomez Jimenez, prisoner since 2013 in Playas de Catazajá and then transferred to El Amate. Accused by the PRI/Green party member Manuel Jimenez Moreno from the community of Pamalhá of an assault which he did not commit, for which he was imprisoned. Once in prison, he was charged with other crimes.
.
.
Ayotzinapa Families Visit San Sebastian Bachajón
The parents of the student compañeros from Ayotzinapa visited the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón in their community to share their struggle. The following are the dignified words of the compas of San Sebastian Bachajón, shared during the visit.
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 17th JUNE 2015
To the fathers and mothers of the 43 compañeros normal school students from Ayotzinapa, disappeared by the Mexican government,
Dear brothers and sisters you are welcome in these rebel lands of the territory of San Sebastian Bachajón, we embrace your struggle, your pain, your rebel dignity which is like ours; know that we walk together to demand the presentation alive of the 43 missing compañeros forcibly disappeared by the bad government. Because they were taken alive, we want them back alive.
Our organization understands your struggle because we are also struggling against the injustices of the bad government that wants to take our land, water, biodiversity and has asassinated our compañeros the social activists and human rights defenders like Juan Vázquez Guzmán on 24th April, 2013 and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano on 21st March, 2014.
We are tired of the abuse and corruption of the bad government that seeks to benefit economically from our natural resources, from our knowledge and the wealth of the territory, but the poverty and hunger in the communities do not matter to them because at election time they have a way of taking advantage of the needs of the poor and the lack of awareness of many brothers and sisters, giving out their crumbs and material things which give no solutions for the present and future of the communities, because they only cause them to remain even poorer.
Compañeros and compañeras, fathers and mothers of the 43 students from Ayotzinapa who were forcibly disappeared by the bad government, we give you all our solidarity and support, we will not rest until justice is done and the bad government presents them alive.
We greet the teachers’ struggle, the communities and organizations in resistance, the collectives and people from below who scorn this corrupt and exploitative system, and those who are opening their eyes and rejecting the corrupt electioneering system that legitimizes the thieves who say that they are popular representatives.
We demand the liberation of political prisoners in Mexico and the world, including our prisoners in Yajalón JUAN ANTONIO GOMEZ SILVANO, MARIO AGUILAR SILVANO and ROBERTO GOMEZ HERNANDEZ; our prisoners in Playas de Catazajá SANTIAGO MORENO PEREZ, EMILIO JIMENEZ GOMEZ; prisoner in Amate ESTEBAN GOMEZ JIMENEZ.
Never again a Mexico without us.
Land and Freedom
Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Antonio Vivar Díaz Lives!
No dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the disappeared compañeros from Ayotzinapa!
Long live the dignified struggle of our Chol compañeros y compañeras from the ejido Tila!
Because they were taken alive, we want them back alive!
JUSTICE FOR AYOTZINAPA, ACTEAL, ABC, ATENCO!
.
.
San Sebastián Bachajón Ejido Denounces A Death And Peaceful Marches Against The “Looting Of Territory”
Members of the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido, Chilón municipality, reported that on 20 May Delmar Feliciano Méndez, 17 years of age and an adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, died by drowning when two municipal police patrols pursued him until he fell into the river. The ejidatari@s in resistance demanded justice for the death of Delmar Feliciano and expressed that his struggle for the defense of the land and territory will not stop.
Similarly, they published a note announcing that on 29 and 30 May, they would mobilize themselves peacefully to protest “the plundering of our territory and the murders committed by the bad government of Enrique Peña Nieto and Manuel Velasco Coello,” given that “they care nothing about murdering and forcibly disappearing students like our comrades from Ayotzinapa, the teacher comrade Galeano, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, and Juan Carlos Gomez Silvano. Their idea is to sow terror in the communities to continue doing their Narco-State big business,” they added. In addition, they demand “the liberation of our prisoners in Yajalón, JUAN ANTONIO GOMEZ SILVANO, MARIO AGUILAR SILVANO and ROBERTO GOMEZ HERNANDEZ; prisoners in Playas de Catazajá, SANTIAGO MORENO PEREZ and EMILIO JIMENEZ GOMEZ; and our prisoner in Amate, ESTEBAN GOMEZ JIMENEZ.”
.
.
Communique From San Sebastián Bachajón 29th May, 2015
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 29th MAY 2015
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To the collectives and committees of solidarity at a national and international level
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras, today and tomorrow we go out to demonstrate peacefully in the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón in protest against the policy of dispossession of our territory and the murders committed by the bad government of Enrique Peña Nieto and Manuel Velasco Coello.
They do not care when they kill and disappear people like our compañeros the students from Ayotzinapa, our compañero the teacher Galeano, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, Juan Carlos Gomez Silvano, because their idea is to sow terror in the communities so they can continue doing the big business of the narco government.
We denounce the ejidal commissioner of San Sebastian Bachajon Alejandro Moreno Gomez, who as well as handing over the ejido land, as did the previous [ejidal commissioner] Francisco Guzman Jimenez alias the goyito, now is going to be a politician of the municipality of Chilon, it is the same strategy of the bad government in other ejidos, so that the the ejidal authorities will betray their community in exchange for a few pesos and public office. Also the narco governor from the green party Leonardo Guirao Aguilar municipal president of Chilón moves up to federal deputy to continue his corruptions.
Our organization continues to struggle with dignity for our territory and the freedom of our imprisoned compañeros, we will not allow the bad government to continue to abuse our people for the benefit of the rich.
We demand the release of our prisoners in Yajalón JUAN ANTONIO GOMEZ SILVANO, MARIO AGUILAR SILVANO and ROBERTO GOMEZ HERNANDEZ; prisoners in Playas de Catazajá SANTIAGO MORENO PEREZ, EMILIO JIMENEZ GOMEZ; prisoner in Amate ESTEBAN GOMEZ JIMENEZ.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas, Mexico, we send an embrace and combative greetings from the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón.
Never again a Mexico without us
Land and Freedom
Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the disappeared compañeros from Ayotzinapa!
Long live the dignified struggle of our Chol compañeros y compañeras from the ejido Tila!
JUSTICE FOR AYOTZINAPA, ACTEAL, ABC, ATENCO!
.
.
San Sebastian Bachajón denounces death through persecution
The compañeros from San Sebastián Bachajón informed the free media of the circumstances in which Delmar Feliciano Méndez, adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle from San Jerónimo Bachajón, died last 20 th May.
The incident occurred at approximately 4:30 pm, when two patrols of the municipal police from Chilon, Chiapas, were chasing the 17-year-old in the barrio of Santa Lucia. While the compañero was trying to escape from the police, he fell into the river and died. There is already an administrative record of the events of 20th May in the Public Ministry at Bachajón.
The compañeros say that their struggle for the defence of the land and territory will not cease, and they demand justice for the death of compañero Delmar Feliciano Gómez.
http://komanilel.org/2015/06/01/san-sebastian-bachajon-denuncia-muerte-por-persecucion/
.
.
A Gathering In New York: Ayotzinapa, El Barrio And San Sebastián BachajónWritten by Jessica Davies
|
| “We walk the same steps though our rhythms are different”Toward the end of the visit of Caravan 43 to the United States, a remarkable gathering of dignified struggles took place in New York. Representatives of the relatives of the 43 disappeared students of Ayotzinapa met in an exchange with Mexican migrants from Movement for Justice in El Barrio, and, through video messages, also with the indigenous Tseltal ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón in Chiapas. All those present at the gathering are in struggle on a daily basis for dignity and truth against the lies, injustice, death, displacement and dispossession perpetrated by the capitalist system of those from above. As part of this gathering, all present joined together in commemoration of the assassinated leader from Bachajón, Juan Vazquez Guzman. Messages were received from as far away as Uruguay and the United Kingdom, and from the renowned thinkers Sylvia Marcos and Raul Zibechi. This gathering of communities is a wonderful example of the inspiration that can be obtained from solidarity and from sharing struggles, uniting pain and dignified rage into hope, action and resistance. |
“It is a great honor for us to walk the path of this dignified struggle with our dear compas from Ayotzinapa. It is wonderful to know that among our peoples, those from below, there are people like the mothers, fathers, sisters and brothers, the families of the 43 students from Ayotzinapa. Dignified people who struggle with all their hearts to change the world.”
– Josefina Salazar, Movement for Justice in El Barrio.
Representatives of the families, friends and classmates of the 43 student teachers from the Rural Normal School in Ayotzinapa, who were forcibly disappeared last September, are currently traveling through different parts of the Americas and Europe in Caravan 43, to share their story and to raise awareness of their call for the return of the students alive. As part of this courageous undertaking, three groups toured the United States in April, their visit culminating in the last week of that month with a convergence in New York City to meet with human rights representatives at the United Nations.
It was at this time that the family members visited and spent an evening with the members of Movement for Justice in El Barrio (Movement), an organization of mainly Mexican migrants who struggle for dignified housing and against gentrification and displacement in East Harlem. Now celebrating its tenth anniversary, Movement has 900 members, 80 percent of whom are women, spread out over 85 building committees.
The gathering, which was conceived and structured in the form of an exchange, coincided with the second anniversary of the assassination of “our beloved compa,” the spokesperson, community organiser and activist from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, who was killed for his defense of the ancestral lands of his people against dispossession, a struggle which continues in his memory. “Two years since the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán,” in the words of Raúl Zibechi to the meeting, “they want to take away the land from the community of San Sebastián Bachajón to build tourist complexes, roads, airports … to continue accumulating riches and to continue plunging the peoples into more abject poverty.” The community of Bachajón took the opportunity to share in the gathering by means of video messages, one addressed to the families of Ayotzinapa, and one to the members of Movement, so the struggles of the three groups could come together.
“We are the same because we are different”
This quotation is a Zapatista saying highlighted by Sylvia Marcos at the recent EZLN Seminar “Critical Thought versus the Capitalist Hydra,” which was held soon after the gathering featured in this article, and which echoed the same reflections.
The visitors were greeted on arrival at the church in El Barrio with hugs, and each one was presented as a gift with a beautiful image of the meeting of the struggles of the Ayotzinapa families and Movement. In this picture, a woman from one organization joins hands with one from the other, their hands entwined with a banner reading “solidarity and resistance across borders.” The two slogans at the bottom read: “They took them alive, we want them back alive,” and “We shall not be moved.” In the background is a dove, and the word “Justice.” These images symbolize the nature of the gathering. Journalist Katie Earle in her account of the event wrote, “While the struggles may seem unrelated to the uninitiated, the common ground was made clear throughout the evening.”
After all involved had told their stories and shared their pains, their struggles and their hopes, through the spoken word, through videos, and through the reading of letters and the sharing of words of homage, the names of the 44 people – 43 disappeared students and one murdered indigenous community leader – who were being especially remembered that evening were called out, each one being answered with the word “Present.” At this point, the families of Ayotzinapa and of Movement came together for dinner, where they were joined by other groups also suffering oppression, such as gay, lesbian and transgender organizations and other people of color such as the Philippine women’s group Gabriela NY, and the New Jersey youth group the Mexican American Progress Movement. This opportunity for all these groups to discuss what they have in common reflected one of the most important aims both of the gathering and of all the groups involved: to break down the barriers that those from above use to divide us through multiple forms of oppression and through the creation of borders.
“Whether or not you vote, ORGANIZE”
The Ayotzinapa families, Movement for Justice in El Barrio, and the adherents to the Sixth Declaration from San Sebastián Bachajón have all become widely respected for their ability to organize, and to inspire others to do so as well, for we are all constructing the same liberation and fighting the same system of power and money. Subcomandante Moisés in one of his contributions to the Seminar emphasised: “Whether or not you vote, ORGANIZE … Let’s organize ourselves, each person where they are, let’s struggle to organize ourselves, let’s work to organize ourselves, let’s begin by thinking about how to start to organize and let’s gather together in order to unite our organizations for a world where the people command and the government obeys.”
It is as a result of this ability to organize that the different struggles come together, as Sylvia Marcos wrote to the gathering in El Barrio about the families of Ayotzinapa: “In their stubborn pursuit of their beloved lost children in landfill sites in the Mexican State of Guerrero, they meet with other struggles and voices in solidarity which accompany them giving homage to the 43 disappeared. It is terrible and marvellous that poor people aspiring to be teachers have become the best professors through the power of pain turned into dignified rage. So that Mexico and the world can wake up and ask and question, and be accompanied.”
And collectives from England sent their words to the gathering: “Tonight we all share and unite in our pain and our rage and our struggles and our memory. To the compañeras and compañeros of Movement for Justice in El Barrio, we warmly congratulate you on the completion of 10 years of dignified struggle against neoliberal displacement in the heart of the neoliberal monster. We thank you also for the wonderful example of fellowship and companionship that has developed between yourselves and the indigenous Tseltal ejidatarios of Bachajon, nourished by the memory of our beloved brother Juan Vázquez Guzmán, whose memory and example remain with us, a light of hope and dignity accompanying our struggles. His words were true and honest, his passion and dedication in defence of human rights and our mother earth were tireless, and his love for his people, their lands and territory will have no end. He gave his life for this struggle and he will always continue to inspire his sisters and brothers as their dignified resistance continues.”
The urgent need for organization was subsequently summed up by Sup Galeano at the EZLN Seminar: “All that we have, that is to say, our survival in spite of everything and in spite of everyone above who has come and gone in the calendars and geographies, we do not owe to individuals. We owe it to our collective and organized struggle.”
“The Zapatista heart that is ours”
“In this ruthless war of capital against those from below, the following meet in resistance now, here, together making an echo amplifying their own history: the family and absent compañeros of Ayotzinapa, the migrants of Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York, and the common landholders and villagers of San Sebastián Bachajón who suffered the unpunished assassination of the distinguished defender from that territory, Juan Vasquez.
“The resistances and rebellions are joined together, they amplify one another, they intensify each other, they strengthen one another and we unite ourselves in them with the Zapatista heart that is ours,” writes the Mexican feminist writer Sylvia Marcos in her moving letter to the gathering.
Inspiration from the Zapatistas is something that all these struggles from below have in common. The families of Ayotzinapa have received solid and consistent support from the Zapatistas, Movement have woven their struggle throughout with Zapatismo, and the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón are strong adherents to the EZLN’s Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle. Those who participated by letter from around the world shared this common link. A video of the silent march of the Zapatistas in support of Ayotzinapa was therefore shown near the beginning as a way to highlight Zapatismo throughout the evening.
Sup Galeano summed up another common thread at the recent Seminar: “The great majority of the world, not just in our country, is like you, brothers and sisters, family members of the Ayotzinapa missing. People who have to fight day and night for a little piece of life. People who have to struggle in order to wrench from reality something with which to sustain themselves. Anyone from below, man, woman, otroa, who lives this painful history, sympathizes with your struggle for truth and justice. They share your demand because in your words they see their own history, because they recognize themselves in your pain, because they identify with your rage.”
“The year of resistance with dignity, of dignified rebel rage.”
In his powerful words which were read as his contribution to the gathering, the Uruguayan writer and analyst Raúl Zibechi describes the last year: “It has been a year full of resistances, of struggles, of the dignity of those from below. It has been a year of repression and death, destruction and forced disappearances. Those from above, fearful of losing their power, want to destroy us. It has been one of the most difficult years in the recent history of Mexic … It has been the year in which they could no longer hide the war of extermination against the peoples …
“But it has also been the year of resistance with dignity, of dignified rebel rage. In this year the common landholders of San Sebastián Bachajón not only kept up their resistance but also recuperated their lands, the lands that had been stolen from them, they defended them against the bad government and will continue to do so. By acting in this way, determined and peaceful, they became an example of dignity to other community members who decided to join the struggle.
“The families and friends of the 43 of Ayotzinapa, in this very difficult year, gave demonstrations of dignity to Mexico, Latin America and the world. They turned their pain into political action by winning the streets to share their rage, which has become a collective rage, the rage of everyone. In doing so they showed us a path, the only path able to overcome fear: to move collectively, to turn ourselves into communities in movement.”
Today we walk, holding hands….
This momentous evening concluded with words and music from the different groups attending. A videomessage of solidarity from members of the anti-displacement group Springfield No One Leaves, from Springfield, Massachussets, was screened. The families of the disappeared students then called for accompaniment on their march to the United Nations, which was to take place three days later to demand that Mexico and its international partners bring justice to the Ayotzinapa disappeared. This call was answered by many of the people present, who carried the image made for the meeting, along with Zapatista figures, on this march.
Let us finish with some words of hope from Raúl Zibechi’s message which perfectly encapsulate the significance of this New York gathering: “In streets and fields, in cities and ejidos, we are sisters and brothers struggling, resisting, making ourselves one with others who resist. First pain brought us together. Now rage continues to unite us in fellowship. Walking in dignity, we find each other.
“Today we walk, holding hands, the common landholders of San Sebastián Bachajón, the families and friends of the 43 of Ayotzinapa and Movement for Justice in El Barrio. We come from distant geographies, from different places, but we share the same pain and now also we walk the same steps though our rhythms are different. Walking together, we leave footprints that draw a new map, a new geography: one of the dignity that unites us, of the rage that drives us.”
This article was originally published in Spanish in Desinformemonos.
.
.
May 31, 2015
San Sebastián Bachajón: The Struggle Against Dispossession In Mexico
Written by Ricardo Lagunes and Jessica Davies
April 24th, 2015, marked the second anniversary of the vicious assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, community leader, spokesperson and social activist from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, “in whose memory our struggle continues.” Despite the killing of two of their leaders and frequent attacks from local government-supporters and public security forces, the ejidatarios (common landholders), adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, remain firm in their resistance to dispossession, and in their struggle in defense of their ancestral land, territory and Mother Earth. The situation has now become critical. A local court has rejected the legal case of the ejidatarios against appropriation of their common lands by the Mexican government. This openly violates the rights of the ejido to consultation, to free, prior and informed consent and offers impunity to political elites and transnational corporations who dispossess indigenous people from their lands in favor of neoliberal megaprojects.
The CNI analyses repression against the original peoples
The peoples, nations and tribes making up the National Indigenous Congress (CNI), gathered together recently to analyze “the repressive wave against the peoples” conducted by “the capitalist narco-governors who seek to take over our homeland.” They released a statement of their position, in which they stated: “the repression which the bad government has carried out against our peoples is in response to our decision to continue with our resistance, so that we can continue to exist, in spite of the bloody war of extermination…..which they conduct in order to consolidate their economic interests, which are based on exploitation, dispossession, repression, and contempt.”
The CNI goes on to list some of the different faces and reflections of this dispossession and continued resistance. Their second example is: “The Tseltal community of San Sebastián Bachajón, in the municipality of Chilón, Chiapas, has faced the repressive forces of the bad government, who have tried to dispossess them of [their lands near] the Agua Azul waterfalls, which they intend to hand over to capitalist interests. In fact, on March 21st of this year, more than six hundred members of government security forces burned down the regional headquarters of San Sebastián; our brothers and sisters, and the free press, which has stood in solidarity with their struggle, have been assaulted…..while the state police and Mexican army have escalated their occupation of their territory in support of the paramilitary groups.”
In this wave of repression the indigenous peoples face dispossession from their lands, territory, culture, history, traditions and life itself to make way for megaprojects which offer them nothing but death; these include mining projects, roads, airports, aqueducts, hydroelectric or wind power schemes, industrial developments, gas or water pipelines, and, in the case of San Sebastián Bachajón, luxury hotel developments for tourist businesses.
Background
In 2006, the then governor of Chiapas revealed a plan to “build a new Cancún in northern Chiapas,” and many of the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón started organizing to defend their territory. In 2007, they became adherents to the Zapatista Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle. Also in 2007, plans were announced for the long-discussed Palenque Integrally Planned Centre (CIPP) or “the Gateway to the Maya World,” a luxury tourist megaproject involving a new airport and superhighway, the jewel in the crown being international hotel developments at the stunning waterfalls of Agua Azul, access to which involves passing through the territory of the ejido Bachajón. Dispossessing the ejidatarios of these lands thus became crucial to the plan, which involved multinational corporations in co-operation with the three levels of the Mexican government and the co-opted ejidal leaders.
It is clearly laid down in national and international treaties, including the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Convention 169 of the International Labour Organization, Article 2 of the Constitution of the United States of Mexico, and the San Andrés Accords, that as indigenous peoples, the Tseltales of San Sebastián Bachajón have the right to free, prior and informed consent in relation to their lands and natural resources, and the right to free determination of their affairs. This absolute right to consultation and consent has been violated and ignored time and again, and instead groups of government-supporting ejidatarios – known as officialists – from the PRI political party started organizing shock groups in the area, and an officialist ejidal commissioner was imposed illegally on the ejido. The scene was set.
Following repression, threats and harassment, the conflict culminated on the 2nd of February, 2011, when an armed eviction of the ejidatarios of the Sixth from the area around Agua Azul was carried out by officialists from San Sebastián and from neighboring communities, with the support of around 800 state and federal police. The following day, national and state public forces entered the territory and arrested 117 people, under the pretext that it was all an intra-community conflict.
Following this, in March 2011, Franciso Guzman Jiménez, former commissioner of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, one of the leaders of the attack, made an agreement which handed over an area of Bachajón’s land to the Chiapas state government and to the National Commission for Natural Protected Areas (CONANP.) He did this without the prior consent of the assembly of the ejidatarios, therefore the ownership of these lands, and of the toll-booth, giving access to the waterfalls, has been in dispute. The legal case of the ejidatarios is clear, and their lawyer has conducted an action for amparo (order for legal protection) through the courts; a favorable result was anticipated, taking into account all the evidence and the sending of the case to the Supreme Court in the Federal District through the initiative of the Third Collegiate Tribunal in Tuxtla Gutiérrez.
The amparo against dispossession
The ejido San Sebastián Bachajón has sustained a legal battle since 2011, because the Mexican government has, by means of acts of violence since February 2nd of 2011, claimed ownership of the ejidal land in common use where access is gained to the “Agua Azul Waterfalls” Ecological Centre. Following their violent entry, the officialist ejido leader signed an agreement with the government; through this they sought to give a cover of legality to the dispossession of the common use lands, which had not been authorized in the highest body representing the ejido, the ejidal assembly.
Faced with such arbitrary actions, the ejidatarios filed, in March 2011, for the amparo 274/2011 before the Seventh District Judge in the State of Chiapas. After three rulings for its dismissal by the Seventh District Judge, on September 29th of 2014, the Third Collegiate Tribunal in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas, in order to resolve the amparo in review 224/2014, overturned the dismissal and asked the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation to consider the case due to its associated legal significance; since the case of Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón is a reflection of the conflicts that led to the armed uprising of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation in 1994, for this reason the Court noted that it was appropriate for the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation to decide the issue of the ejido, so that thereby the foundations could be laid for the resolution of dozens of cases of the same kind in the region on the matter of the rights of indigenous peoples.
On November 19th 2014 the rapporteur Minister Margarita Beatriz Luna Ramos (originally from San Cristobal de Las Casas, Chiapas) proposed to the Second Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation not to exercise their right to decide Bachajón’s amparo and they returned it to the Third Collegiate Tribunal to be resolved.
On April 6th 2015 the Third Collegiate Tribunal contradicted its arguments and issued a judgement denying the amparo to the ejido, by giving value as evidence to the agreement made between the former Governor Juan Sabines Guerrero and the former officialist ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón, Francisco Guzmán Jiménez; this decision openly violates the rights of the ejido to consultation and to free, prior and informed consent. All of this is in order to benefit the political elites and transnational tourism companies, which is the reason they have designed counterinsurgency strategies to give it the appearance of an inter- and intra-ejidal conflict.
Given these abuses a signature campaign and petition were launched to demand the enforcement of international treaties signed by the Mexican State; because up to now the Judicial Power of the Federation has favoured and privileged the impunity with which the dispossession of the indigenous peoples of Mexico has been operated. The call is made to join with the appeals of the compañeros and compañeras adherents to the Sixth and to expose the judges of the Third Collegiate Tribunal in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas who obey, answer to and operate politically for the transnationals.
Recent events
The ejidatarios of Bachajón have never given up their rights to their lands, territory and natural resources, and have continued tirelessly to carry out a dignified struggle in defense of these rights. So, on December 21st of 2014, more than 400 ejidatarios peacefully recuperated the lands surrounding the toll-booth, which they were robbed of in 2011, and set up a day and night guard over the area. At this time they were joined by a growing number of non-adherent ejidatarios.
In a communiqué on January the 18th, the ejidatarios explain what happened next: “On the ninth of January the bad government sent more than 900 police to evict the women and men guarding the reclaimed lands… On the eleventh of January we began to block the road from Ocosingo to Palenque at the Agua Azul crossroad, where we blocked the road for several days to demand that the public forces leave our land, but the government ordered its police to fire at us with high calibre firearms… In spite of this attack the compañeros and compañeras responded with courage and dignity and we maintained a total blockage of the road until a few days ago, when it became an intermittent and informative road block accompanied by national and international solidarity of women and men of good heart. We inform you that our compañeros and compañeras are going to remain in the place where we have been since January 11th until the police leave our lands.”
On January 29th, faced with a constant police presence and a situation of high tension, with the ejidal commissioner, Alejandro Moreno Gómez organizing shock-groups which “fire into the night with high-calibre weapons to frighten the population,” the ejidatarios issued a communiqué: “We continue to do the work of resistance defending our people and territory from dispossession by the bad government; for this reason we are building a San Sebastián regional headquarters to be a place of work, workshops and exchanges. The work at this headquarters starts today; we have built it a kilometer from the Agua Azul crossroad and from the border with the official municipality of Tumbalá.”
The tension increased. There remained a heavy presence of public forces in the area and the government continued to give support to the officialists, led by the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez and the security adviser Samuel Díaz Guzmán, who were threatening to evict the regional headquarters and attempting to criminalize the organized people of Bachajón through the fabrication of crimes, both by accusing them of being authors of assaults on the road between Ocosingo and Palenque, and also by organizing roadblocks at the Agua Azul turning and blaming the ejidatarios for these. At the same time, the commercial press was stoking the fire by reporting: “An armed confrontation is expected at any moment between opposing groups who are disputing the area, which is one of the attractions of our state to national and international tourism.”
The burning of the San Sebastian regional headquarters
“We denounce that today, March 21st of 2015, at around 8 o’clock in the morning, more than 600 members of the public forces burned down our San Sebastián regional headquarters with the participation of the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez and the security adviser Samuel Díaz Guzmán,” the ejidatarios wrote in a communiqué. “Once again the politics of death and the corruption of the bad government are demonstrated, and its contempt for the people and human rights because it seeks to achieve its ambition to get hold of our territory through the dispossession of the land, the water and everything that exists in our country, as if it were merchandise, in order to gain money….. After the violent eviction of 9th of January, 2015, we in our organization established the San Sebastián regional headquarters to continue caring for the land and to demand the withdrawal of bad government, this is where we will continue because we are the original peoples of these lands.”
Two days later the people of Bachajón further denounced the “support of the bad government for the paramilitary leaders Alejandro Moreno Gómez and Samuel Díaz Guzmán” following an attack on two members of the free media who were monitoring the human rights situation. “The bad government uses its cunning and gives them weapons so that at any time they can come to kill us….and so the bad government washes its hands saying the problem is between indigenous and they are killing each other, and for this reason it then sends its public forces to take away our lands.”
The fallen leaders
In their March 21st communiqué the indigenous organization stated; “We remember today with dignified rage that it is a year since the killing of our compañero Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, coordinator of the organization in the community of Virgen de Dolores.” It is surely not a coincidence that this day was selected. March 21st is also the sixteenth anniversary of the Zapatista “consulta”, when citizens of Mexico were invited to vote on questions about the San Andres Accords on indigenous rights and culture, in an example of true consultation, something the indigenous peoples of Bachajón have been consistently denied.
The communiqué continues: “and next month will mark two years since the killing of our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán, secretary general of our organization, in whose memory the struggle in San Sebastián Bachajón continues.” There has been no justice, the authorities have yet to shed any light on his murder, or to arrest anyone in connection with it, but Juan still accompanies the struggle of his people, who remember his words and what he stood for. A recent short film, The Dignified Resistance of San Sebastián Bachajón continues, ends with a tribute: “In memory of our brother Juan Vázquez Guzmán. A light of dignity and struggle and the true word become man. Compa Juan Vázquez Guzmán we embrace your legacy. Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The struggle continues!”
As they prepare for Juan’s annual homage, his compañeros continue his struggle for the land and for the mother earth. “We demand the withdrawal of public forces and of the national commission for protected natural areas from our lands, dispossessed since February 2011. We demand freedom for our political prisoners Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández and of the unjustly imprisoned compañeros Santiago Moreno Perez, Emilio Jimenez Gómez and Esteban Gómez Jiménez.”
And the words of Juan find an echo: “We are original peoples of these lands and we have rights that they cannot just come and take away like this with their police and paramilitaries. Our word and struggle has more strength because it comes from dignity and the love of life, of the land; our struggle is not for ourselves, it is for our children, for our grandchildren to come, because we have the right to defend and care for the land, to be autonomous and to decide what is the best way to live as a people, we do not need political parties, neither do we need the bad government to come to tell us what to do.”
Article originally published in Spanish: http://desinformemonos.org/2015/04/san-sebastian-bachajon-la-lucha-contra-el-despojo/
For further information: https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com/en-ingles/
.
.
Commemoration of Juan Vázquez Guzman iin San Sebastián Bachajón, 24th April 2015
(The video is in Spanish and Tseltal)
In honour of our dear brother Juan Vázquez Guzmán, human rights defender from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón who was assassinated two years ago, we are posting this new video made by the free media Kolektivo Zero and Radio Zapote during the commemoration of Juan on 24th April, 2015. The commemoration was held at Juan’s family home and in the video solidarity letters are read. In the words of his companer@s, “after two years, we do not forget you compa, you will continue to live in our hearts.”
Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
.
.
Sylvia Marcos: About Juan Vázquez Guzmán Of Bachajón And Ayotzinapa
“Second Annual Commemoration In El Barrio, New York
In Memory Of Juan Vázquez Guzmán”
On 23rd April, 2015, family members of the 43 disappeared Ayotzinapa students visited Movement for Justice in El Barrio in New York.
During this special meeting, they commemorated together the beloved compa Juan Vázquez Guzmán, community leader, spokesperson and activist from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón.
During this commemoration in New York in honour of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, the feminist writer Sylvia Marcos from Mexico also sent her word by means of the following letter:
Letter/Message From The Mexican Feminist Writer Sylvia Marcos
Juan Vasquez Guzman was assassinated and Bachajon remains under siege.
Other resistances burst into the calendars and geographies.
The compañeros from San Sebastián Bachajon are attacked defending their territory from the greedy clutches of capital which wants to take over the ownership of the waterfalls of Agua Azul, of this territory owned by indigenous ejidatarios, to transform into pseudo-ecological tourist centres, with luxury hotels. They want to dispossess the ejidatarios and also to exploit their geographical area to extract biofuels.
This is why they killed compañero Juan Vasquez, because he was the great defender of his territory.
They want to invade and transform these lands to extract resources of all kinds and benefit big business and their accomplices in corrupt governments.
The state and federal police continue to illegally occupy the territory.
But … Juan Vasquez lives on in the struggle which goes on and on.
I now greet the compañeros from Ayotzinapa, the parents with absent children, stolen, disappeared, who are joining their struggle with the struggle of Movement for Justice in El Barrio in New York.
The orphans of the tragedy of Ayotzinapa are not alone, in their stubborn pursuit of their beloved lost children in landfill sites in the Mexican State of Guerrero, they meet with other struggles and voices in solidarity which accompany them giving homage to the 43 disappeared.
It is terrible and marvellous that poor people aspiring to be teachers have become the best professors through the power of pain turned into dignified rage.
So that Mexico and the world can wake up and ask and question, and be accompanied.
In this ruthless war of capital against those from below, the following meet in resistance now, here, together making an echo amplifying their own history: the family and absent compañeros of Ayotzinapa, the migrants of Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York, with the common landholders and villagers of San Sebastián Bachajon who suffered the unpunished assassination of the distinguished defender from that territory, Juan Vasquez.
The resistances and rebellions are joined together, they amplify one another, they intensify each other, they strengthen one another and we unite ourselves in them with the Zapatista heart that is ours.
.
.
From England: About Juan Vázquez Guzmán Of Bachajón And Ayotzinapa
“Second Annual Commemoration In El Barrio, New York
In Memory Of Juan Vázquez Guzmán”
On 23rd April, 2015, family members of the 43 disappeared Ayotzinapa students visited Movement for Justice in El Barrio in New York. During this special meeting, they commemorated together the beloved compa Juan Vázquez Guzmán, community leader, spokesperson and activist from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón.
During this commemoration in New York in honour of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, the Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group and the Committee of the True Word for South-West England also sent their word by means of the following letter:
To the family and friends of Juan Vázquez Guzmán
To the adherents to the Sixth Declaration from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón
To the families and friends of the 43 disappeared students of Ayotzinapa
To the members of Movement for Justice in El Barrio
Compañeras and Compañeros
We send you our warmest and most affectionate greetings from the United Kingdom as you gather together in homage to honour our fallen compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán.
Our thoughts will be with you all this evening, as the memory of Juan brings us all together and helps to unite our different struggles. We will hold alongside you a small act of homage. Your continuing resistances are an inspiration to us, and we know that you will give strength and hope to each other as you bring your memories together and renew your commitment to walking the path towards dignity, freedom and justice, as compañero Juan has taught us.
It is now two years since Juan was cruelly assassinated, but his memory and example remain with us, a light of hope and dignity accompanying our struggles. His words were true and honest, his passion and dedication in defence of human rights and our mother earth were tireless, and his love for his people, their lands and territory will have no end. He gave his life for this struggle and he will always continue to inspire his sisters and brothers as their dignified resistance continues.
To the compañeras and compañeros from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajónwe in our small and humble way offer you our continuing solidarity, and will remain alert as to what happens in your territory. We energetically condemn the repression and harassment you face day after day. The assassination of Juan has not been resolved, you have once again been dispossessed of your recuperated lands, your regional headquarters has been burned down, and your amparo has been denied. We know that all this is the work of the bad government and their lackeys who seek to dispossess you from your heritage. We know also that truth and justice are on your side, along with national and international solidarity, and that the struggle will never end.
To the compañeras and compañeros the families and friends of the disappeared students of Ayotzinapa, we thank you for not giving up your search for the live presentation of your sons and for making Mexico and the world aware of the true situation in your country Mexico. People all over the world are supporting you and we welcome the forthcoming visit of three of your compañeros to London, during their European tour. Tonight we all share and unite in our pain and our rage and our struggles and our memory.
To the compañeras and compañeros of Movement for Justice in El Barrio, we warmly congratulate you on the completion of ten years of dignified struggle against neoliberal displacement in the heart of the neoliberal monster. We thank you also for the wonderful example of fellowship and companionship that has developed between yourselves and the ejidatarios of Bachajon, nourished by the memory of our beloved brother.
They tried to bury Juan Vázquez Guzmán but he was a seed which has sprouted and now grows and flourishes. There will be many Juans, because those who give their lives for the land do not die but live on in every act of freedom and rebellion. Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, and continues to care for the mother earth, the natural world, and his people, and to give strength and spirit to their resistance. Hasta siempre compañero.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The San Sebastián Bachajón struggle continues!
We send you an embrace of companionship
Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group
Committee of the True Word for South-West England
23rd April, 2015
Commemoration of Juan Vázquez Guzmán (Spanish and Tseltal)
“Second Annual Commemoration In El Barrio, New York
In Memory Of Juan Vázquez Guzmán”
Message From Raúl Zibechi
On 23rd April, 2015, family members of the 43 disappeared Ayotzinapa students visited Movement for Justice in El Barrio in New York. During this special meeting, they commemorated together the beloved compa Juan Vázquez Guzmán, community leader, spokesperson and activist from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón.
During this commemoration in New York in honour of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, the writer Raúl Zibechi from Uruguay also sent his word by means of the following letter:
To: Movement for Justice in El Barrio.
On the second anniversary of the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán
Compañeros, Compañeras:
It has been a year full of resistances, of struggles, of the dignity of those from below.
It has been a year of repression and death, destruction and forced disappearances. Those from above, fearful of losing their power, want to destroy us.
It has been one of the most difficult years in the recent history of Mexico. So hard that it recalls 1968, when the Tlatelolco massacre took hundreds of students from us.
It has been the year in which they could no longer hide the war of extermination against the peoples.
Two years since the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán. They want to take away the land from the community of San Sebastián Bachajón to build tourist complexes, roads, airports … to continue accumulating riches and to continue plunging the peoples into more abject poverty.
2014 has been the year of the disappearance of the 43 from Ayotzinapa, in order to destroy the normal schools, in order to disappear the teachers committed to their peoples -teachers who accompany the struggles from below, who work together to reclaim memory – and, above all, in order to prevent the teachers and peoples, together, from building a new world.
But it has also been the year of resistance with dignity, of dignified rebel rage.
In this year the common landholders of San Sebastián Bachajón not only kept up their resistance but also recuperated their lands, the lands that had been stolen from them, they defended them against the bad government and will continue to do so. By acting in this way, determined and peaceful, they became an example of dignity to other community members who decided to join the struggle.
The families and friends of the 43 of Ayotzinapa, in this very difficult year, gave demonstrations of dignity to Mexico, Latin America and the world. They turned their pain into political action by winning the streets to share their rage, which has become a collective rage, the rage of everyone. In doing so they showed us a path, the only path able to overcome fear: to move collectively, to turn ourselves into communities in movement.
In streets and fields, in cities and ejidos, we are sisters and brothers struggling, resisting, making ourselves one with others who resist. First pain brought us together. Now rage continues to unite us in fellowship. Walking in dignity, we meet each other.
Today we walk, holding hands, the common landholders of San Sebastián Bachajón, the families and and friends of the 43 of Ayotzinapa and Movement for Justice in El Barrio. We come from distant geographies, from different places, but we share the same pain and now also we walk the same steps though our rhythms are different. Walking together, we leave footprints that draw a new map, a new geography: one of the dignity that unites us, of the rage that drives us.
We are all Aytozinapa!!!
We are all San Sebastián Bachajón!!!
Raúl Zibechi
Montevideo, April 21, 2015
.
.
2 Years After His Assassination Juan Vázquez Lives!
In San Sebastián Bachajón yesterday 24th April was a day of homage to Juan Vázquez Guzmán, who was an authority of the Ejido who fought with all his good heart to defend their lands against the ferocious appetite of the bad government and of the transnationals in Mexico and the world.
Although his struggle was always peaceful, on 24th April 2013, at 9.00 pm, a group of men entered his house and, after a few minutes of discussion, gun shots were heard, and a truck leaving the ejido. Shortly afterwards his brother saw Juan lying on the ground in front of the door of his house, with several bullet wounds.
The family are still demanding justice, and 2 years later the crime remains unpunished, there have been no investigations and no one has been arrested.
On this day, family, neighbours and nationals and internationals in solidarity gathered in the humble home of Juan Vázquez to recall his memory and continue to demand justice and his firm intention to continue fighting to defend their lands. During the religious ceremony it was open to anyone who wanted to speak in Tzeltal or Castilian. Representatives of the Free Media spoke to give their support. Several statements of support were then read from various regions of Chiapas and the world. The compañera read with much emotion. The ceremony ended with a plate of food shared by everyone present.
WORDS SHARED BY THE BROTHER OF JUAN VÁZQUEZ 24/04/2015
In Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón,
April 24, 2015
By this means we allow ourselves to send you cordial greetings (…)
From the family of the late Juan Vázquez Guzmán
“Today 24th April, 2015, the commemoration is being held of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, human rights defender. His two sons, one of eight and one of six years old, are now living with his grandparents.
This compañero was killed in front of his home on 24th April, 2013, by a group of assassins from the bad government.
Also we honour his memory and remember his dignified struggle for his people.
From the northern state of Chiapas, the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón send militant greetings.
Never again a Mexico without us.
Tierra y Libertad!
Juan Vásquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Justice for Ayotzinapa,
Hasta la victoria siempre…”
Video: @MovimientoJusticia Transcripcion video: @Pozol Fotos: @Valk
http://espoirchiapas.blogspot.mx/2015/04/a-2-anos-de-su-asesinato-juan-vazquez.html
******
Message From The Family Of Juan Vázquez Guzmán
.
.
Friday 24th April, 2015 marks the second anniversary of the brutal assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán of San Sebastián Bachajón.
On 23rd April, 2015, members of the families of the 43 disappeared students from Ayotzinapa visited Movement for Justice in El Barrio in New York. During this special gathering, they commemorated together the dear compa Juan Vázquez Guzmán, community leader, spokesperson and activist of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón.
For this commemoration, Juan Vázquez Guzmán’s family sent the following videomessage.
Narrated by Juan’s brother Julian, the videomessage tells how Juan was shot by thugs of the bad government outside his house, and leaves two sons, aged 6 and 8, who are being brought up by their grandparents.
.
.
Legal Motion Denied To The Ejidatarios Of San Sebastián Bachajón
Ejidatarios from San Sebastián Bachajón, who struggle against the imposition of tourist megaprojects on their land, have been denied the legal motion they had presented to the courts in March 2011. After three cancellations, an attempt to transfer the case to the Supreme Court for Justice in the Nation, and despite the the detection of violations of due process, a federal tribunal denied the motion 274/2011. In a communique released on 10 April, the anniversary of the murder of Emiliano Zapata, the ejidatarios reported their knowledge of the refusal of the motion, reaffirmed their commitment to the struggle against the State, and denounced that official authorities are meeting with party-members from the region, seeking to develop strategies to crush their own autonomous process.
This struggle over the management of lands surrounding the Agua Azul waterfalls has resulted in three violent displacement operations, two murdered communal leaders (Juan Vázquez Guzmán, killed on 24 April 2013, and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, killed on 21 March 2014), and several political prisoners. Recently, the ejidatarios also had their regional headquarters burned down, in an operation that involved 600 police, who threatened two autonomous journalists and took their equipment.
In the latest communique, released on 11 April, the ejidatarios make an invitation to the commemoration of the murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán. On 24 April, the second anniversary of his, a mass will be held in the family home of Juan Vázquez Guzmán at 3pm.
As a means of popular pressure, a petition has been launched on www.change.org, and the Chiapas Centre for Women’s Rights seeks signatures for its communique in support of the ejidatarios.
.
.
Worldwide Pronouncement in Solidarity with our Compañer@s of San Sebastián Bachajón in their Dignified Struggle for their Land and Territory
We reject, denounce and strongly condemn the repressive actions committed by the three levels of government, their state forces and local lackeys against our compañer@s, adherents to the Sixth, from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, Mexico.
21st March is a date of great significance for the organized indigenous peoples of Mexico. March 21, 2015 is the sixteenth anniversary of the Zapatista “consulta”, when 5,000 representatives of the EZLN travelled throughout Mexico inviting citizens to vote on four questions concerning the San Andres Accords on indigenous rights and culture. This consulta is just one example of the ways in which the Zapatistas have taught us about true democracy. But, for the Tseltal peoples of Bachajón, the situation has been very different; their rights as indigenous peoples to self-determination and full consultation have been violated again and again, and the only consultations that those from above and their lackeys have offered them have been mere simulations and deceptions.
March 21, 2015 is also the first anniversary of the murder of Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, regional coordinator of the organization in the community of Virgen de Dolores. It is surely no coincidence that on that day, at 8 am, more than 600 members of the public forces burned down the San Sebastián regional headquarters, with the participation of the ejidal Commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gomez and the Security Adviser Samuel Díaz Guzmán. In this way, our compañer@s were also violently evicted from their recuperated lands, and the bad government has violated once again those same San Andrés Accords.
We remember well that on January 9, 2015, more than 900 members of state and federal police violently evicted the compañer@s guarding and protecting the land that belongs to them and which they had recovered peacefully on December 21, 2014, for the benefit of the people of Bachajón. The ejidatarios adherents remain firm in their resistance, so, to continue and strengthen their struggle, on 29th January they began to build the regional headquarters of San Sebastián on these lands to be a place for work, workshops and sharings.
These lands legally and rightfully belong to the indigenous Tzeltal ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, and are judicially protected under an amparo. However, the three levels of government have chosen once again to evict the ejidatarios using aggression and repression, in total violation of the rights of the indigenous inhabitants.
It is well known that the government and big companies want to deprive the indigenous peoples of their territory in order to build a luxury tourism development. As indicated earlier, the right of the Tzeltal people of San Sebastián Bachajón to free, prior and informed consent about the megaproject has been ignored, and this area of their ancestral land has been appropriated without the permission or consent of the ejido. This means that the acts of dispossession of 9 January and 21 March were illegal and clear violations of the human rights of the communities.
The rights of indigenous peoples to build their autonomy and to the use and enjoyment of their territory are laid down in national and international treaties that Mexico has signed: the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Convention 169 of the International Labour Organization, Article 2 of the Constitution of the United States of Mexico, and the aforementioned San Andrés Accords. We demand an immediate end to the violation of these rights. We also demand full guarantees and respect for all the rights of the indigenous peoples of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, especially their rights to life, liberty and personal integrity.
We are also outraged that two compañeros from the free media have been attacked by the government-supporting group of the ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón, Alejandro Moreno Gómez. We will remain alert and vigilant and follow developments in the ejido closely, remaining alert for any acts of aggression. We hold the three levels of government and the current ejidal authorities responsible for the security and integrity of the ejidatarios, and for any acts of violence, harassment or intimidation that may occur.
We offer all our solidarity to our compañeras and compañeros who struggle for the benefit of their peoples and to defend their lands and territories, their natural resources and our mother earth. We call on all people of good heart to undertake actions of solidarity and fellowship to accompany the dignified struggle of the people of Bachajón, according to their own ways, times and geographies.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón Struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón Struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
Signatures:
Groups and Collectives:
Agencia Prensa India (API), Mexico
ASSI (Acción Social Sindical Internacionalista)
Associació Solidaria Cafè Rebeldía-Infoespai, Barcelona, Catalonia
Associazione Ya Basta! Milano, Italy
Caracol mundo-eco de latido en solidaridad, Austria
Caracol Solidario, Besançon, France
Caracol Zaragoza, Spanish State
Casa Nicaragua, Lieja, Belgium
Centro de Documentación sobre Zapatismo -CEDOZ- Spanish State
Centro de derechos humanos de los pueblos del Sur de Veracruz “Bety Cariño” AC, Mexico
CGT – Spanish State
Colectivo Contra la Tortura y la Impunidad A.C.
Colectivo Educación para la Paz y los Derechos Humanos A.C
Colectivo Votán Zapata, Coyoacan, Mexico
Manchester Zapatista Collective, UK
Comitato Chiapas “Maribel” – Bergamo, Italy
Chiapas Support Committee, Oakland, CA, US
Committee of the True Word for South-West England, UK
Comité Tierra y Libertad de Lille, France
Coordinadora Valle del Chalko, Edo. De Méx., Mexico
CSPCL (Comité de Solidaridad con los Pueblos de Chiapas en Lucha), Paris, France
Decolonial Food For Thought, Los Angeles, US
Digne Rage Collectif, France
Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, UK
Edinburgh Chiapas Solidarity Group, Scotland
Espoir Chiapas, France
Grupo CafeZ, Lieja, Belgium
Gruppe B.A.S.T.A., Münster, Germany
KIPTIK, Bristol, UK
La Adhesiva, Barcelona, Catalonia
La Asamblea Veracruzana de Iniciativas y Defensa Ambiental (LAVIDA) Xalapa. Veracruz, Mexico
La plataforma vasca de solidaridad con Txiapas, Basque Country
LA Sexta en Surponiente-DF,Mexico
Les trois passants, Paris, France
London Mexico Solidarity Group, UK
MASA (MesoAmerica Solidarity Action), Liverpool, UK
Movement for Justice in El Barrio, New York, US
Mujeres y la Sexta, Mexico
Mut Vitz 13, Marseilles, France
Nodo Solidale (Italy and Mexico)
Oye Latino on Wellington Access Radio, New Zealand
Plataforma de Solidaridad con Chiapas y Guatemala de Madrid, Spanish State
Proceso de articulación de la sierra de santa Marta, sur de Veracruz, Mexico
Red de mujeres de la tierra unidas por un futuro y un mundo mejor AC
Red Global por la Paz en México, Tokyo
Resistencias Enlazando Dignidad-Movimiento y Corazón Zapatista, Mexico
Servicio paz y Justicia (SERPAJ), Morelos, Mexico
Shades of Silence, US
Somos los Otros NY, US
TXIAPASEKIN, Plataforma Vasca de Solidaridad con Chiapas, Basque Country
Wellington Zapatista Support Group, New Zealand
UK Zapatista Solidarity Network
UK Zapatista Translation Service
UK Zap Sol
Zapatista Solidarity Group – Essex, UK
Zapatista Teaching and Learning Collective, UK
Individuals:
Alberto Arellano Mariano, Mexico
Pietro Ameglio, Servicio paz y Justicia (SERPAJ), Morelos, Mexico
Abraham Antonio Alonso Reyes, Mexico, D.F
Cynthia Astudillo
Hugo Blanco, Peru
Raquel Carrillo, Tijuana, Mexico
Marlene Castañeda, Mexico, D.F.
Enriqueta G. Chávez López, Mexico
Paulin Chávez Rojas, Mexico
Susana M. Clares Fuente, Mexico
Jessica Davies, UK
Rosalba Dávila Ortiz, Puebla, Mexico
Gerson de Lima Oliveira, Porto Alegre, Brazil
Rosa de Santiago Fernández, Colima, Col., Mexico
Jair De Zouza Faria, Río de Janeiro, Brazil
Francisco José Díaz Marcilla, Lisboa, Portugal
Joandy Diego, Colorado, US
Juliette Doman, MASA (MesoAmerica Solidarity Action), Liverpool, UK
Rogelio Estrada Serafín, Chihuahua, Chih., Mexico
Gustavo Esteva, Mexico
Michael Farley, MASA (MesoAmerica Solidarity Action), Liverpool, UK
Ángela Fernández, Mérida, Yucatán, Mexico
Iris S. Fiala, Austria
Davey Flynn, UK
Myriam Fracchia, Servicio paz y Justicia (SERPAJ), Morelos, Mexico
Aranza Galván Abrego, Celaya, Gto., Mexico
Milton Gómez Membrila, Colima, Col., Mexico
Víctor Manuel Gutiérrez Torres, Xalapa, Veracruz, Mexico
Jorge Herrera, New Zealand
Malú Huacuja del Toro, Mexican writer
James Jackson, MASA (MesoAmerica Solidarity Action), Liverpool, UK
Karla Jiménez Cano, Puebla, Pue., Mexico
Sensei Gregory C. Lewis, US
Ricardo Lagunes Gasca, Mexico, D.F.
Ninón Llano Guibarra, La Paz, Bolivia
Tomas Alberto Madrigal, multi-medios Karani
Vianey Magallón Martínez, Bahía de Banderas, Nayarit, Mexico
Gabriel Magallón Reyes, Bahía de Banderas, Nayarit, Mexico
José Manuel Martín, Zamora, Mich., Mexico
Juan Carlos Marmolejo Álvarez, Coahuayana, Michoacán, Mexico
Gerardo Medina Reyes, Zamora, Michoacán, Mexico
Hector Mejia, Torreon, Coahuila, Mexico
Alejandro Mendoza
Erik Montero Espinosa, Mexico, D.F.
Zeb Moon, Colombia
Verónica Munier, Mexico
Violeta Neponuceno Valencia, Tlapa, Gro., Mexico
Óscar Ojeda, Mexico, D.F
Alin Palacios Fonseca, Guanajuato, Mexico
Eleanor Parry, MASA (MesoAmerica Solidarity Action), Liverpool, UK
Hilda Pérez Alejandre, Querétaro, Qro., Mexico
Alexandra Pita González, Colima, Mexico
Guillermo Popoca Boone, Mexico
Susana Ramírez, Zamora, Mich., Mexico
María de Jesús Ramírez Magallón, Mexico
María Isabel Ramírez Magallón, Mexico
Mónica Cecilia R. Andrade. Puebla, Mexico
José Ramírez Magallón, Mexico
María Refugio Magallón Mejía, Mexico
Rita Robles, Mexico, D.F.
Víctor Romo de Vivar Gayol, Zamora, Mich., Mexico
Gabriela Ruiz Manzur, Copenhagen, Denmark
Haydeé Sánchez, Mexico, DF.
Teresa Santos Durán, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
Zeus Tepeyolotl Martinez, Mexico, D.F.
Ana Torres, Mexico, D.F.
Miriam Elizabeth Toscano Dolores, Colima, Col., Mexico
Ana Valadez Ortega
Carolina Valdés, Colima, Col., Mexico
Abraham Eduardo Vallejo Moreno, Colima, Col., Mexico
Irene Vázquez Magallón, Puebla, Pue., Mexico
Alejandra Vázquez Mendoza, Zamora, Michoacán, Mexico
Norma Vázquez Torres, Colima, Col., Mexico
Rosa Villanueva Ramírez, Washington, US
Luisa Villanueva Villalobos, Los Angeles, Ca., US
Julie Webb-Pullman, Gaza City, Palestine
Lourdes Zepeda, Colima, Col., Mexico
Raul Zibechi, Uruguay
.
.
Request for signatures for Bachajón
Jeny Pascacio
Diario de Chiapas
Social organizations are seeking signatures to defend the people of San Sebastián Bachajón on www.change.org in their case before the Federal Court after it endorsed the dispossession of indigenous ejido lands in Chiapas.
“The judges obey and operate politically for the transnationals and for this reason wecinclude their names, emails and phone numbers, so that from anywhere in the world we can let them know that we are aware of their corruption.”
Since 2011 the Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, located in the municipality of Chilón, has conducted a legal battle because the Mexican government has awarded itself ownership of the ejido land in common use where you gain access to the “Agua Azul Waterfalls” Ecotourism Centre, according to the version of villagers.
“The agreement with which they try to give legality to the dispossession of lands in common use was not authorized in the ejido assembly, the highest representative body of the ejido. Faced with such arbitrary decisions, the ejidatarios filed, in March 2011, a petition for amparo 274/2011 before the Seventh District Judge in the State of Chiapas.”
After three cancellations decreed by the Seventh District Judge, on September 29, 2014 the Third Collegiate Court in Tuxtla Gutierrez, to resolve the Amparo in Review 224/2014, overturned the acquittal and asked the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation to review the case due to its legal transcendence.
“The case of Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón reflects the conflicts which gave rise to the armed uprising of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation in 1994, for which reason the Court noted it was appropriate for the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation to resolve the root of the ejido problem, so that thereby the local courts could sit to solve dozens of cases of the same kind in the region on the rights of indigenous peoples.”
Through a press release, they stated that the Third Collegiate Court contradicted their arguments and issued a statement denying the amparo to the ejido, by giving value to the agreement made between the last administration of the state government and the government-supporting then ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón, Francisco Guzmán Jiménez.
http://www.diariodechiapas.com/metropoli/17355-solicitan-firmas-por-bachajon
.
.
Mexican Justice approves land grab in Chiapas
Desinformémonos
Injustice and impunity continues against the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajon, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN), who have been fighting a legal battle over the last four years, after the Mexican government transferred the ownership of the ejido lands.
The Third Collegiate Tribunal in Tuxtla Gutierrez referred the case to the Supreme Court of Justice (SCJ), but the minister Beatriz Luna proposed to the court to return the case to the Tribunal. In recent days this body of justice denied the ejido’s amparo, and, although this was derived from the amparo, the Third Tribunal ordered all the government authorities of Chiapas not to continue the acts of dispossession; the decision to recuperate the land on 21st December last was due in part to the legal foundation that was given them in advance of the judgement on their rights.
Despite the strong repression and harassment, the ejidatarios maintain their position of continuing with their actions. On 9th January at least 900 members of the federal and state police evicted them from the lands which had been recovered since 21st December. On 19th March, ejidatarios adherents were victims of dispossession and the burning down of the offices where they shared information, taught workshops for the community and collected contributions from tourists entering the waterfalls of Agua Azul.
San Sebastián Bachajón is one of the largest ejidos in Mexico with 70,000 hectares, it is an area of high biodiversity and natural beauty, where political interests have looked for tourism investment. This land is rich in natural resources, green forest, wildlife and water. The waterfalls of Agua Azul are among the greatest attractions of Chiapas state; in certain seasons they acquire a turquoise hue that makes them even more attractive for foreign tourists.
In 2007, the ejidatarios became part of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, and made the decision to exercise their right to self-determination as a people. They then erected a tollbooth on their territory, so that tourists who wanted to visit the waterfalls of Agua Azul would pay a fee. With the money collected, they decided in assembly, they would support sick ejidatarios and the most needy families, explains the journalist Gloria Muñoz in her opinion column in the newspaper La Jornada.
In March 2011, Juan Sabines Guerrero, former governor of Chiapas, put on the table the representatives of the ejido Bachajón, those from the area of Agua Azul and his entire government Cabinet, and signed agreement no 274 whereby the two peoples supposedly pledged to donate the lands to the state to establish a single toll booth. This left the state as administrator of the road through the Ministry of Finance of Chiapas and the Commission of Natural Protected Areas of the federal government, when the surface area of Agua Azul was not even in this category.
After more than four years of tireless struggle to defend their territory, the San Sebastián Bachajon ejidatarios have resisted even though two of their main leaders were assassinated, many of its inhabitants have been imprisoned and tortured; and six of them are still deprived of their freedom.
.
.
Communiqué From San Sebastián Bachajón 11th April 2015
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 11th APRIL 2015
To the General Command of the Clandestine Indigenous Revolutionary Committee of the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
By this means we allow ourselves to communicate and to inform in advance all the compañeros and compañeras of the organizations that are in the struggle and the resistance of the land, that on 24th April this year the commemoration will be held of the late Juan Vázquez Guzmán, recalling his dignified struggle in San Sebastián Bachajon, Chiapas. The event will be held at the family home and there will be a Mass starting at 3:00 pm.
We give this invitation to everyone who wants to participate.
We thank you in advance for your understanding and your presence on that date.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas, the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón send our combative greetings.
Never again a Mexico without us
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the disappeared compañeros from Ayotzinapa!
JUSTICE FOR AYOTZINAPA, ACTEAL, ABC, ATENCO!
.
.
Bachajón, a chronicle of destruction at the hands of the Chiapas government
On March 21, 600 members of the public security forces burned down the regional headquarters of our compañeros, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, from the rebel ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón, located a few meters from the toll booth of the National Commission for Protected Natural Areas for the Agua Azul waterfalls, in the northern jungle of the state of Chiapas. That same day, in the afternoon, compañeros from the free media collectives Kolectivo Zero and Koman Ilel were attacked while doing documentation work about the events, by ejidatarios who are affiliated to political parties, in the presence of the security forces.
This is a clear strategy of the capitalist system, to plunder the land to satisfy its economic interests. The government of Mexico has sold its territory piece by piece to transnationals, and we see clearly their ways of carrying out these projects of death in three stages, which are: the sale of land, dispossession and plunder.
The sale of Mexican territory has been going on for a long time through their meetings, summits and forums, such as NAFTA, the United Nations Conference on Climate Change or the Mesoamerica Project, where despite their various masks and speeches about development and progress, all they do is to share out the natural resources of the earth.
The dispossession of territory is applied through different strategies such as the welfare programmes of the bad governments which seek to destroy in all areas their worst enemy, which is “Autonomy;” a first step in this plan of dispossession is to parcel out ejido land won in the Mexican Revolution, through plans of counterinsurgency and paramilitaries; this immediately breaks the traditional organising customs of the original peoples, turning them towards individual rather than communal ways of life, or through means of an education that is based on preparing children and young people to serve the capitalist system. In the countryside, these programmes which are provided firstly involve GMOs, making the land in the best cases become dependent on these chemicals, and in the worst cases become infertile, thus transnationals or to give a more specific example, Monsanto, can afford to hoard, patent and control the production of food; it is important to mention that this is a circular deal because these chemicals cause diseases that force people to consume pharmaceutical drugs, moving away more and more from their traditional medicines such as herbal treatments, which connect directly with Mother Earth and often have a lot to do with their cosmology.
These are just some very general examples of the attack from the capitalist system towards indigenous peoples, it is necessary to dig deeper into each of these projects of death to identify a better collective resistance strategy for the salvation of the original peoples, who are the foundation of the existence of mankind in terms of living well. In our history we can see that if people become aware and resist all this, the state’s response is immediate repression, imprisonment, torture and death. Those from above do not care about the existence of peoples who resist and defend their traditional ways of life, uses and customs, and they make every effort to hand over the natural resources to extractive transnationals, so that later they can plunder freely, so as to destroy all autonomy and reduce human beings to just being a workforce in the service of big capital.
San Sebastián Bachajón, also a member of the Indigenous National Congress, like many other peoples, is aware of this situation of dispossession and death, so they have resisted and continue to resist, our compañeros do not need anyone to come from outside to tell them how to care for the mother earth, they have done so throughout history, and therefore they have been a target of interest for the bad governments who only look to the earth for its monetary value; our Tseltal compañeros work every day not only to maintain their autonomy, but also to build a world where many worlds fit, the Spanish name of our compañeros’ destroyed headquarters is “Where those from above destroy, those from below reconstruct” (the name of the first international festival of rebellion and resistance against capitalism, convened by the EZLN and CNI), a name that is entirely in accord with their history of struggle.
http://kolectivozero.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/el-pasado-21-de-marzo-600-elementos-de.html
.
.
Communiqué from San Sebastián Bachajón 10th April 2015
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 10th APRIL 2015
To the General Command of the Clandestine Indigenous Revolutionary Committee of the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Icha spatil a wotanik ta ha pisilik jmololabex, ants winiketik macha`tik nokòl skoltabel slum skinalik, lìh ya jkabeyexkoyik ta nael jkoopkotik yuun te jkoltabel te jkinalkotik sok ya jna`kotik te skuxlejal jmololkotik Emiliano Zapata te laj yak skuxlejal yuun te skinal sok skotayel slumal.
Greetings to all the compañeros, women and men who are in the struggle for the land, here we share our word on the defence of the land and recall the memory of our General Emiliano Zapata who gave his life for land and freedom for the peoples.
We continue in struggle against the politics of the murderering, thieving and corrupt bad government which does not like our organization, so it burned the San Sebastián regional headquarters with support from Alejandro Moreno Gómez, ejidal Commissioner and the security adviser Samuel Diaz Guzman, together with 600 Chiapas state police; and also on 9th April there came to the community of Xanil the Agrarian Procurator of Ocosingo, with lic. Juan René and the Undersecretary of Yajalón whose surname is Alpuche, adviser to the paramilitaries of Paz y Justicia, where they had a meeting with the members of the PRI-green parties followers of Alejandro Moreno Gomez, to seek agreement on how to put an end to our organization because they say they no longer want to have this organization in the community, because they like to be with the government and its lackeys and minions, handing over the land, despising autonomy and the life of the peoples.
It makes us angry to see how these bad ejidal representatives feel themselves to be owners of the ejido and sell their dignity for crumbs. Our organization knows that the bad government’s mouth is watering at all the natural resources of our territory, so it is looking to make division among us in order to kill us and send us to prison, where the people are the only losers and the government and their national and foreign businesses are the winners because they dispossess the land.
We have had it up to here with this bloody government looking to fuck us over, but the people will not remain silent and will defend whatever the cost, we do not want this bad government to carry on abusing the people, deceiving the people and making fun of the people, the bad government should die, SO SHOULD PEÑA NIETO AND HIS PUPPET VELASCO COELLO.
We understand that the Third Appellate Court of Tuxtla Gutierrez denied our amparo 274/2011, which was started in March 2011, because value was given to the agreement signed by the PRI with the thief of Juan Sabines Guerrero and the judges of the court said that the agreement respects the human rights of the community and that is for their benefit. These judges are traitors to the fatherland, corrupt and racist, they sold themselves to the government so as to continue sitting on their arses in their big offices, big cars and white houses like the one peña nieto has, because they do not care about the people.
There is no democracy and no law in this country hijacked by the bloody corrupt politicians, let them all go away, the people must wake up and fight to defend the lands, dignity and life. Our organization will continue to defend our Mother Earth in honour of our grandfathers and grandmothers who taught us how to defend it and as it was defended by the compañeros Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano.
We demand the immediate release of political prisoners in Mexico and the World and of our imprisoned compañeros Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano, Roberto Gómez Hernández, Santiago Moreno Perez, Emilio Jimenez Gomez and Esteban Gomez Jimenez.
Lih ta ya`hkolal slum kinal chiapas, ants winiketik yuun San Sebastian Bachajon yaj jtikonbeyex cotik spatil a wotanik ta pisilik.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas, the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón send our combative greetings.
Mayuk bin hora jun mexico, te me mayukonkotike`
Never again a Mexico without us
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the disappeared compañeros from Ayotzinapa!
Long live the dignified struggle of our Chol compañeros and compañeras of the ejido Tila!
JUSTICE FOR AYOTZINAPA, ACTEAL, ABC, ATENCO!
.
.
Zapatista Sympathizers Chased From Land Slated For Tourism Megaproject
Members of an indigenous community located in the path of a major development project in Chiapas, Mexico say hundreds of police and armed civilians attacked and burned down communal buildings at the heart of a land dispute in area where the government wants to develop an ecotourism resort.
Tim Russo reports from San Cristóbal de las Casas.
An ongoing struggle over land in one of the most biodiverse regions of Mexico reached a new boiling point over the weekend when state police and armed civilians attacked a community of Zapatista sympathizers in San Sebastian Bachajón.
A spokesman for the Tzeltal indigenous landowners in San Sebastian Bachajón – who asked for anonymity for security reasons – says the attack began at around 8 a.m. on Saturday March 21st when approximately 600 state police and machete-wielding area residents shut down access points to the pro-Zapatista enclave. He says police fired tear gas as attackers forced their way into buildings and later set them on fire.
Hours after the initial attack, an armed mob detained a group of independent journalists as they attempted to document the aftermath. Two reporters were promptly manhandled, held with machetes to their throats and bodies and stripped of their smart phones and high-end digital cameras.
The eyewitness said a local political figure led the attack along with residents of a communal landholding known as an “ejido” in order to retain total economic control of the famed Agua Azul waterfalls on their jointly-owned lands.
The waterfalls are the centerpiece of a planned resort and theme park that has been on hold since 2007, largely due to opposition from pro-Zapatista communal landowners. The proposed resort in San Sebastian Bachajón is part of a larger tourism megaproject known as the Ruta Maya – or Mayan Route.
The proposed project – and its promised benefits – has created a rift within the San Sebastian Bachajon community. The faction in favor, led by the de-facto mayor, has received support from state institutions while opponents have been under pressure to give up their fight under threat of displacement and violence.
Since the project’s introduction in 2007, more than 160 local opponents have been arrested and two opposition leaders have been killed.
The latest attack came on the anniversary of the murder of local organizer Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano and just days after the Zapatista National Liberation Army announced an international seminar called Critically Thinking in the Face of the Capitalist Hydra, to be held in Zapatista territory and San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas from May 3rd through the 9th.
http://fsrn.org/2015/03/zapatista-sympathizers-chased-from-land-slated-for-tourism-megaproject/
.
.
Video From The Women Of San Sebastián Bachajón For International Womens’ Day
The women of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, who struggle for the mother earth, on International Womens’ Day ask that all police leave their territory and that their rights are respected; they also send greetings to all the compañeras and compañeros who have been in solidarity with the struggle of San Sebastián Bachajón,
Viva the Dignified Struggle of Women!
Viva Zapata!
Viva the Zapatistas!
Viva Comandanta Ramona!
.
.
The Agua Azul Dispute
From their vehicles, tourists stared in awe at the hooded Tzeltal indigenous people, who were sat on the edge of the road that leads to the Agua Azul waterfalls. Their machetes and facemasks were incongruous with the image of a quiet earthly paradise that is promoted by the state government of Chiapas.
The Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) sympathizers from San Sebastián Bachajón were charging tolls and distributing flyers to the tourists. In a statement, they explained their Dec. 21, 2014 decision to retake control of the portion of their ejido (communally-owned land) where the toll booth for access to the waterfalls is located.
“The comisariado ejidal (the ejido administrative official) Alejandro Moreno Gómez does not provide information about the money that comes from paying at the entry or the gravel bank. We want to appoint someone else who can manage the resources that are ours,” explained an ejido member to Latinamerica Press.
On Jan. 9, the farmers were evicted by government order and then, while they were blocking the road, they were attacked by agents of the State Police who fired at them for about 20 minutes. Two people were injured.
In a further attempt to intimidate the residents, on Mar. 21, 600 troops of the public forces, which respond to the orders of Moreno Gómez, according to the ejido members, burned the ejido regional headquarters in San Juan Bajachón, built by the adherents to the EZLN Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle (2005) — a statement against the capitalism that “turns everything into merchandise, turns people, nature, culture, history, conscience into merchandise” — near the waterfalls.
“Is demonstrated again the policy of death and corruption of a bad government, its contempt for the people and human rights, because of his ambition on our territory to strip the land, water and everything that exists in our country to make money as if these are merchandise,” denounced the residents.
Attacks against common landowners
Few tourists know that Agua Azul, the location of the beautiful turquoise waterfalls amidst wild vegetation, is one of the most contentious areas of Chiapas. In 2008 the US tourism consulting firms EDSA and Norton Consulting recommended to government authorities to ensure that visitors feel safe and protected in the region.
“The Zapatista movement is still strongly associated with Chiapas,” wrote the consulting firms in a document on the development strategy for the construction of a luxury hotel in the area. “Chiapas is still considered unsafe by many who are not familiar with the region.”
Three years later, on Feb. 2, 2011, 17 tourists who were in Agua Azul had to leave the area by air. That day a pro-government shock troop attacked the Zapatista sympathizers who were managing the toll booth. Subsequently there was a clash that killed a member of the assault troops, Marcos Moreno García, while state and federal police, supported by army troops, arrested 117 sympathizers.
“We have no problems with the owners of the restaurants that are in the area that is part of the Tumbalá Municipality. But here, where the toll booth is, is our territory, and the money belongs to us,” stated Juan Vázquez Guzmán, leader of the supporters of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle (2005) of San Sebastián Bachajón, on June 2012, to Latinamerica Press.
Less than a year later, Vázquez Guzmán, who was 32 years old and had two children, was murdered outside his home with six shots. A similar fate occurred to his friend Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, who was shot 20 times in an ambush on Mar. 21, 2014.
Six months after the death of Gómez Silvano, three Bachajón ejido members were arrested and tortured with the charge of attempted murder of a uniformed officer, a charge based only on police officers’ testimony. “Their detention was revenge for having sought justice for our friend Juan Carlos,” denounced Domingo Pérez, spokesman for the Zapatista sympathizers of San Sebastián Bachajón, at a press conference in Sep. 2014.
What is disputed in Agua Azul is more than the control of the money charged for entering the area. Since 2000, the government has been planning to build a theme park on the banks of the waterfalls, which would be part of the Palenque-Agua Azul Waterfalls Integrally Planned Center (CIP), an infrastructure network planned as part of the Mesoamerica Project — the new name of former Puebla Panama Plan that promotes regional integration and development and coordinates the efforts and actions of the nine states that make up the Southeast region of Mexico, the seven countries of Central America, Colombia and the Dominican Republic — which the government hopes will transform Chiapas to a new Cancun.
Chiapas, the new Cancun?
According to former State Senator for the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) María Elena Orantes López, the CIP would generate revenues of US$6.8 billion per year. 30,000 jobs would be created for the indigenous communities in the area, but they would “not participate in management positions, but with their labor,” as Roberto Albores Gleason, the former Secretary of Tourism of Chiapas, stated in 2008.
The firms EDSA and Norton Consulting recommended the former governor of Chiapas Juan Sabines Guerrero — who ended his term in 2012 — to finalize the acquisition of the land adjacent to the waterfalls before attracting investments. The construction of the new electrical network that will support the project is already finished, foreseen in the 2007-2012 Institutional Program of the Chiapas Secretariat of Tourism. The plan included the relocation of indigenous communities from six municipalities in the area, opposed by the support bases of the EZLN and its sympathizers.
The CIP also plans other projects, such as the construction of a new international airport in the city of Palenque, which opened in February 2014, and a superhighway between this ancient Mayan city and San Cristóbal de Las Casas. The government says that the 105-miles highway will benefit all surrounding communities, although much of the population is against the project because of the environmental damage that it would cause and because the true purpose of the highway is to accelerate the plundering of Chiapas’s resources.
In 2009, the government was forced to suspend the highway construction plan due to popular opposition, particularly from the Mitzitón community, which was victim to the violence of the paramilitary group Army of God. After five years, in 2014, technicians came back to take measurements on land that is in the path of the alleged highway, and the villagers were summoned to meetings with government officials to discuss the highway. However, the superhighway and theme park projects in Agua Azul are an enigma; they appear and disappear from official documents.
“The government does not want to provide adequate information to the communities so they do not know the extent of the damages. It does not give details because it knows that it will have a very strong social opposition,” says Ricardo Lagunes, attorney for the communal landowners of San Sebastian Bachajón, to Latinamerica Press.
Last January the ejido members of Mitzitón, following the example of communal landowners of Los Llanos (Municipality of San Cristóbal de Las Casas), filed a precautionary measure to prevent the construction of the highway. Subsequently, the authorities denied their intention to build the highway. However, the 2014-2018 National Infrastructure Program estimates an investment of 10 billion pesos ($644 million) for the construction of the highway between San Cristóbal de Las Casas and Palenque, and 1.2 billion pesos ($82 million) for “CIP support projects.”
http://www.eurasiareview.com/06042015-mexico-the-agua-azul-dispute/
.
.
The CNI’s Position on the Wave of Repression Waged against the People
To the original peoples of Mexico and the World;
To the National and International Sixth;
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation;
And to the memory of Don Félix Serdán Nájera, our leading brother.
Gathered in the Amatlán de Quetzalzoatl community in the Tepoztlán municipality of Morelos, the peoples and tribes that make up the National Indigenous Congress [CNI] have analysed the repressive wave which has been launched against us by the narco-capitalist governors who seek to take control of our homelands.
We wish to make clear first of all that the aforementioned onslaught has nothing to do with the party colours that govern from above, nor with the way in which they have been elected or imposed upon us. For, in short, each political party in government simply administrates the dispossession ordered from higher up the chain of command. Therefore, the government’s repressive wave also has nothing to do with the electoral lie that they call democracy, which is essentially no more than a reflex of the decomposition at the core of the bloody system that is neoliberal capitalism, or with the so-called ‘structural reforms’ that it spawns, which are imposed at the expense of the well-being, freedom, and livelihoods of the suffering peoples of both the countryside and the cities.
In reality, the brutally oppressive offensive carried out against our peoples by the Bad Government has come as a response to our decision to continue with our determined resistance, which hopes to safeguard life in the face of a vicious war of extermination. In other words, it is not simply an example of political persecution but a manifestation of reactionary distress from those governing from above who design elaborately violent operations in order to consolidate their economic interests, which are based on exploitation, dispossession, repression, and disdain. And, as we will outline below, this reaction has come in a number of different forms:
- First of all, we still feel today the absence of the 46 comrades from the Raúl Isidro Burgos teacher training college in Ayotzinapa who were killed or disappeared on the orders of the three levels of the Bad Government, and on behalf of all of the political parties, which have turned terror into a business and a means of governing. However, while the criminal State bets on oblivion, the peoples of Mexico bet on reconstruction, and on neither forgetting nor forgiving those responsible for the crimes committed against the People. For what is at play is the past and the future – which both belong to us.
- We also remember how the repressive forces of the Bad Government have tried to dispossess the Tzeltal community of San Sebastián Bachajón, in the Chilón municipality of Chiapas, of the Agua Azul waterfalls, which they have hoped to hand over to capitalist interests. In fact, on March 21 of this year, more than six hundred members of government security forces burned down the San Sebastián regional headquarters. Furthermore, the comrades of San Sebastián and the free press, which has stood by them in solidarity with their struggle have been assaulted frequently by public security forces while the state police and Mexican army have also escalated their occupation operations in the territory, in support of the paramilitary groups present there.
- The Nahua community of Santa María Ostula on the coast of Michoacán, meanwhile, has faced attacks from groups thought to be both linked to organised crime and in cahoots with each level of the Bad Government. The cost of this onslaught has been the disappearance of five community members and the murder of thirty-two more. Additionally, on March 16, 2015, the Mexican Navy tried to dislodge and disarm the community police that had controlled a checkpoint on the main coastal road near the settlement of Xayakalan since recovering the territory in 2009. In response to the government attack, the community closed the road, aware of the fact that disarmament would mean handing their territories over to narco-paramilitary groups and exposing themselves to further dispossession, which would pave the way for the megaprojects of death like mining, multinational tourism, and drug trafficking. And all of this, of course, is both defended and sponsored by all three levels of the Bad Government.
- At the same time, our comrades Mario Luna and Fernando Jiménez in Sonora, who are the spokespeople of the Yaqui tribe, remain in prison. The reason for their imprisonment is that they stand accused of having committed serious crimes which have been fabricated by forces that refuse to recognise the ancestral forms of organisation and traditional government of the Yaqui people. Furthermore, an arrest warrant is still out on Tomás Rojo, which represents an attempt to use division and treachery as a mechanism of war, and Lauro Baumea has received numerous death threats in addition to actual attempts on his life. In fact, the latter has also had his vehicle burnt outside of his house, and his family members’ lives are also said to be at risk. And all of this criminal activity has simply sought to ensure the trouble-free robbery of the water of the River Yaqui.
- Likewise, the Loxicha comrades in the State of Oaxaca ,who were kidnapped eighteen years ago by the Bad Government as part of its terrorist and counterrevolutionary policies aimed at protecting large multinational mining projects, also continue to find themselves in prison. Similarly, the Nahua brothers of San Pedro Tlanixco in the State of Mexico have been in prison for twelve years for having defended their water supplies against the capitalist theft of the precious resource for large agro-industrial complexes.
- Meanwhile, the dispossession of communities and ejidos in the states of Morelos, Puebla, and Tlaxcala through the so-called ‘Proyecto Integral Morelos’ (PIM) is still being accompanied by a widespread persecution of the peoples of the Popocatépetl volcano who are opposed to the planned handover of their territory, security, and water to multinational corporations, which seek in turn to build roads, aqueducts, gas pipelines, and thermoelectric plants – all with the protection of the Bad Government’s forces of repression. In fact, there are currently numerous arrest warrants out against those who have dared to raise their voices against the destruction that has arrived along with the police and army officers protecting the machinery, as has recently been seen with the pipelining of the River Cuautla, where the thermoelectric plant of Huexca was supported to the detriment of the ejidos of the Ayala municipality.
- We also empathise with the San Francisco Xochicuautla community in the State of Mexico, whose fight against the construction of a private motorway, which would see them dispossessed of their own territory, has even seen them lose the freedom to speak in their own communal assemblies, which have been occupied by dozens of riot police officers seeking to consolidate the capitalist takeover of the land.
- In addition to all of these cases of resistance against dispossession, thousands more of our comrades have migrated elsewhere in order to survive, with many of them arriving at concentration camps like that of San Quintín in Baja California Sur, where they are exploited and treated like slaves. In this case in particular, for example, the different levels of the Bad Government have supported plantation owners by repressing workers’ mobilisations, which have demanded better working conditions for the thousands of day labourers employed there – most of whom are of indigenous origin.
We are convinced that, in order to stop this war against our communities, slogans are not enough. Nor, we believe, are the calendars, geographies, and techniques of those governing or hypothesising from above adequate for bringing about change. Instead, we consider that we need to forge a new country, and a new world. And the powerful are aware that we know about the need for the construction of a new global system from the grassroots up.
In fact, it is precisely because the Bad Government understands our revolutionary position that it has stepped up its military harassment of the Zapatista Caracoles of La Realidad and Oventik, bolstered by the paramilitary aggressions carried out by groups it has fostered, financed, and trained, like Pojcol, the CIOAC-H, and ORCAO, who have been carrying out a campaign of systematic violence against the Zapatista bases of support in an attempt to destroy their autonomous forms of organisation, which, with their roots in the ancient cultures of our original peoples, brighten up the horizon with a civilizational hope.
Therefore, with all of the aforementioned points considered, we declare that:
- We will not stop fighting for the reconstruction and reconstitution of our original peoples, because that is a struggle for both life and survival.
- We will intensify our battle for the freedom of all political prisoners, for the presentation of the disappeared, and for justice for those who have been murdered.
- The repressive wave in progress is a response to our relentless resistance against dispossession, which is ancient and unnegotiable.
- We will continue the possible and necessary task of weaving a new world from below and to the left, because only in this way will peace shine down upon our peoples and end the incessant repression that plagues us.
- We welcome the realisation of a homage to the comrades Luis Villoro Toranzo and the Zapatista teacher Galeano, which will take place in the Oventik Caracol in Chiapas on May 2, 2015.
For the Total Reconstitution of Our Peoples!
Never Again a Mexico without Us!
The National Indigenous Congress
Amatlán de Quetzalcoatl, Tepoztlán, Morelos
March 22, 2015
Translated by Oso Sabio
Communiqué from San Sebastián Bachajón 23rd March 2015
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 23rd MARCH 2015
To the General Command of the Clandestine Indigenous Revolutionary Committee of the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
The support by the bad government for the paramilitary leaders Alejandro Moreno Gomez ejidal commissioner and the security consultant Samuel Diaz Guzman can be clearly seen when, on 21st March last, after they had set fire to the regional headquarters of San Sebastián, they verbally and physically assaulted a compañera and a compañero from the free media who had come with courage and dignity to document human rights violations by the bad federal and state government.
We reject the attacks on our compañera and compañero from the free media, and we hold the paramilitary chiefs Enrique Peña Nieto and Manuel Velasco Coello responsible for any other aggressions attempted against the free media and women and men of our organization.
Enough of so much abuse and corruption in order dispossess our people of the land and water, we will not allow it, we are not defeated, our struggle and resistance is for all of life and no matter if the government comes to sow terror and destruction, those from below will reconstruct as we were taught by our grandparents who also fought the lords of money and power.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas, the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón send our combative greetings.
Never again a Mexico without us
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the disappeared compañeros from Ayotzinapa!
JUSTICE FOR AYOTZINAPA, ACTEAL, ABC, ATENCO!
Communiqué from San Sebastián Bachajón 21st March 2015
Public Forces burn down regional headquarters
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 21st MARCH 2015
To the General Command of the Clandestine Indigenous Revolutionary Committee of the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras, we denounce that today, March 21, 2015 at around 8 o’clock in the morning more than 600 members of the public forces burned down our San Sebastián regional headquarters with the participation of the ejidal Commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gomez and the Security Adviser Samuel Díaz Guzmán. Once again the politics of death and the corruption of the bad government are demonstrated, and its contempt for the people and human rights because it seeks to achieve its ambition to get hold of our territory through the dispossession of the land, the water and everything that exists in our country, as if it were merchandise, in order to gain money.
We hold the paramilitary chiefs peña nieto and manuel velasco responsible for the violence in San Sebastián Bachajón and for the human rights violations, death and repression of women and men in our organization who do not sell their dignity in exchange for their crumbs.
We reject the tricks of the bad government to malign our struggle and fabricate crimes [and attribute them] to the organization which is defending the mother earth. Together with Alejandro Moreno Gómez the ejidal Commissioner and the Security Adviser Samuel Díaz Guzmán, they set up a roadblock on the road from Ocosingo to Palenque at the high point at the turning to agua azul in order to blame our organization for blocking the road, and also these lackeys of the bad government are cutting down trees and we know that they are fabricating crimes of ecocide so they can arrest the autonomous authorities of our organization.
We disclaim [any link to] these actions organized and supported by the bad government, together with the ejidal commissioner, they are only looking for a way to bend the law so they can put us in prison and dispossess us of our territory for transnational projects which only benefit those from above. After the violent eviction of January 9, 2015, we in our organization established the San Sebastián regional headquarters to continue caring for the land and to demand the withdrawal of bad government, this is where we will continue because we are the original peoples of these lands and we will not allow the bad government to come to command the people.
We remember today with dignified rage that it is a year since the killing of our compañero Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, coordinator of the organization in the community of Virgen de Dolores, and next month will mark two years since the killing of our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán, secretary general of our organization, in whose memory the struggle in San Sebastián Bachajón continues.
We demand the withdrawal of public forces and of the national commission for protected natural areas from our lands, dispossessed since February 2011.
We demand freedom for our political prisoners Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández and of the unjustly imprisoned compañeros Santiago Moreno Perez, Emilio Jimenez Gomez and Esteban Gomez Jimenez.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas, the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón send our combative greetings.
Never again a Mexico without us
Attentively
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the disappeared compañeros from Ayotzinapa!
JUSTICE FOR AYOTZINAPA, ACTEAL, ABC, ATENCO!
600 members of the public forces burn down the regional
headquarters of San Sebastian Bachajón
“Compañeros and compañeras, we denounce that today March 21, 2015 at 8 o’clock in the morning more than 600 members of the public forces burned our regional headquarters known as San Sebastián, with the participation of the ejidal Commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez and the Security Adviser Samuel Díaz Guzmán. Once again the politics of death and the corruption of the bad government are demonstrated, and its contempt for the people and human rights because it seeks to achieve its ambition to get hold of our territory through the dispossession of the land, the water and everything that exists in our country, in order to gain money, as if it were merchandise.
We hold the paramilitary chiefs peña nieto and manuel velasco responsible for the violence in San Sebastián Bachajón and for the human rights violations, death and repression of women and men in our organization who do not sell their dignity in exchange for their crumbs.”
Adherents to the Sixth, ejido San Sebastián Bachajón
Bachajón reports new threat of dispossession
March 20, 2015
The compañeros of the ejido San Sebastian Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, report that the roadblock conducted by political party supporters at the turning to the waterfalls of Agua Azul, which started on 17th March, is continuing; now it is the people of Commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez (ejidal Commissioner) and Samuel Díaz Guzmán (vigilance councillor) who are in charge of this.
The ejidatarios informed us by telephone that the Commissioner is organizing his people to evict the compañeros from San José en Rebeldia and from the “San Sebastian” Regional Headquarters, land recuperated by the compañeros of San Sebastián Bachajón.
The compañeros will not give up the struggle for the defence of their land and territory and for the release of their prisoners.
We ask that you remain aware of the situation of the compañeros.
http://kolectivozero.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/denuncia-bachajon-nueva-amenaza-de.html
.
**************************************************************
.
Ejido Bachajón warns of possible attempt to displace them.
Chilón, Chiapas, March 20. Tzeltal indigenous from the ejido San Sebastian Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration, again disclaim any links with the roadblock at the turning to the Agua Azul waterfalls on the Ocosingo-Palenque highway. They state that it is the people of the ruling ejidal Commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez, and Samuel Díaz Guzmán (vigilance councillor) who are in charge of the blockade.
The ejidatarios reported that Moreno Gómez is organizing his people to evict the ejidatarios from San José en Rebeldia and from the “San Sebastian” Regional Headquarters, land recuperated by the indigenous of Bachajón.
Adherents to the Sixth make it clear that they will not give up the struggle to defend their land and territory and for the release of their prisoners, and ask people to remain aware of the situation of their members, via Kolektivo Zero.
In the same way, commercial dailies report that “at any time, an armed confrontation is expected between opposing groups that are in dispute over the area,” which could lead, as on previous occasions, to government repression. e.g. From Quinto Poder: “Armed group hinders tourism transport and is on the point of a confrontation. Tourism businesses on the Ruta Maya report that at this time, near the Agua Azul Waterfalls, heavily armed people, allegedly Zapatistas, have blocked the road with the aim of recovering 100% of the territory, so they are delaying any vehicle which drives through the area. The conflict, which has lasted for years and has intensified in recent months, is known of by the Government Secretary, Eduardo Ramirez, who has done nothing about it and who has answered repeatedly that he has instructions from the Governor Manuel Velasco Coello not to intervene in the indigenous areas. An armed confrontation is expected at any moment between opposing groups who are disputing the area, which is one of the attractions of our state to national and international tourism.” https://www.facebook.com/mxQuintopoder/photos/a.659347497429276.1073741841.657066724324020/921659737864716/?type=1&theater
.
****************************************************
.
San Sebastián Bachajon Disclaims Any Links With The Roadblock On March 17 And Denounces Attacks
San Cristobal de las Casas, March 17, 2015
Ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, inform us that today, March 17, political party supporters from the community of Suquil Ulub carried out a roadblock at the turning to the waterfalls of Agua Azul, the compañeros adherents denied having any part in this.
They denounced that in recent days they have been attacked by the party supporters. Today in the morning, two compañeros ejidatarios who were carrying out their guard duties were beaten.
They hold Alejandro Moreno Gomez, Samuel Diaz Guzman and the three levels of government responsible for the attacks and for what may happen.
San Sebastian Bachajón continues to demand the release of their prisoners and continues in resistance in defence of its ancestral territory.
The compañeros asked people to be attentive to the situation in the Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón.
http://kolectivozero.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/san-sebastian-bachajon-se-deslinda-de.html
.
*****************************************************
.
Call for screenings of a New Video:
“The Dignified Resistance of San Sebastián Bachajón Continues”
This initiative is supported by the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón
URGENT NEW VIDEOMESSAGE FROM SAN SEBASTIÁN BACHAJÓN
Greetings Compas
So that we can jointly continue to show solidarity with the dignified struggle of their community in Chiapas, Mexico, we are asking people of good heart to organize screenings of this new video made by Springfield No One Leaves and the Committee of the True Word of Alisal. The video is in Spanish with English subtitles, and is approximately 8 minutes long. In the video, the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón send a special videomessage in which they make an urgent call for solidarity.
The video tells of more than six years of struggle by the adherents to the Sixth Declaration from San Sebastián Bachajón against dispossession and in defense of their communal lands. During this time, two of their leaders, Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, have been murdered, and 120 people have been imprisoned. Most of these prisoners are now free, thanks to national and international solidarity, but three political prisoners remain in prison.
Focusing on the continuing dignified resistance of the people of San Sebastián Bachajón, the video features the events surrounding their recuperation, on 21st December 2014, of their lands which had been stolen by the bad government, the violent eviction of members of the community by state and federal forces on 9th January, 2015, and the ongoing intermittent roadblock. Since then, the compañer@s have founded a new regional headquarters called “Región San Sebastián” near the Agua Azul junction. Currently, the regional headquarters is at serious risk of eviction. The film ends with a tribute to the great fighter for justice Juan Vázquez Guzmán.
The video can be downloaded here:
https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com/videos/
To organize a screening, please contact:
movementforjusticeinelbarrio@gmail.com
For more information see the Bachajón website:
https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com/
.
********************************************************************
.
URGENT: Ejidatarios from the PRI and police officers enter the liberated ejido lands
Ejidatarios from the PRI, guarded by several police cars and trucks of the state police, have entered in recent days the area of Agua Azul where the organized ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón are to be found. According to their affirmation, there are threats of eviction and they are aware that an ambush is being prepared to evict the Regional Headquarters and displace the ejidatarios from the recuperated area which belongs to the ejido of San Sebastián.
The first intrusion took place last February 19 at 9 am, when about 45 officialists (pro-government,) party members, and people from the ejidal commission of Alejandro Moreno Gómez came to Agua Azul guarded by several police cars. They gained access to Agua Azul by the Pinquinteel turning in the municipality of Tumbalá, and by the Saquil.Ulub turning in the ejido of San Sebastián. Once there, they intimidated and threatened the compañer@s who are guarding the San Sebastián Regional Headquarters and those who are charging entrance fees to Agua Azul.
The commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gomez insisted on making arrangements to collect [the toll] together with the independent ejidatarios from Agua Azul in Tumbalá. But they denied that CONANP has again become the administrator of the natural resources and the income they generate. Having failed to reach any agreement, the party supporters withdrew along with state, municipal and judicial police at 4pm.
On February 20, the party supporters returned, entered again and set up camp on the land which was dispossessed in 2011, guarded by 3 state trucks.
Construction of crimes
Another form of repression and harassment being suffered by the ejidatarios adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle is by the legal and media path through the construction of crimes. The main accusation that they receive is that of being the authors of the assaults that occur on the stretch of road between Ocosingo and Palenque. Already several ejidatarios have been imprisoned on charges of robbery and assault, and it appears that the municipal government plans to charge them again so as to be able to issue arrest warrants as a result of some events which occurred on 17th January.
On 17th January three attackers were arrested on the section of the highway between Ocosingo and Palenque. These offenders have been known to the police who patrol this section for the last four years. In spite of this, in the prosecution district Selva Palenque, Juan Alvaro Moreno from Xanil is negotiating their release. As the organized ejidatarios explain, it is intended to blame the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle for the crimes committed by these criminals, telling the population and the tourists that the “hooded ones” are the attackers.
By referring in this way to the ejidatarios adherents to the Sixth, the police seek to create confusion and fear to divide the population.
The media are also complicit in this strategy of governments and big businesses to criminalize the independent ejidatarios and the adherents to the Sixth. Through various media campaigns in which they emphasize the uncertainty on the highway, making a direct associated between the roadblocks and the attacks, they are justifying a supposed security plan. This plan was coordinated between the General Secretariat of Government, the security and the law enforcement agencies and was introduced on 6th February. Its application means the introduction of more police units in to the area between Ocosingo and Palenque.
Opinion
It is not valid to incriminate the Zapatistas [supporters] for the crimes committed on this stretch of the highway, because their struggle is against the dispossession of their lands. Some years ago the compañer@s even collaborated in the arrests of these attackers because few people live in this stretch, and the risk they pose to the security of the municipalities is well known. As an organization they should not be held responsible for these criminals because what they seek is justice.
.
*********************************************************
.
In San Sebastián Bachajón The Struggle For Life And Territory Continues: Autonomy, Resistance And Organization.
Ejidatarios from the PRI threaten to evict the new Regional Headquarters
After several years, the conflict in San Sebastián Bachajón has reached a moment of high tension. On the one hand, ejidatarios both adherents to Sixth and independents, hold their positions in the area of Agua Azul, defend the territory from the new Regional Headquarters of Bachajón and demand the formal resignation of the old government-supporting (officialist) commissioner. On the other hand, the national government keeps public forces in the area and supports the ejidatarios co-opted by the PRI who threaten to evict the Regional Headquarters.
Independent ejidatarios and adherents to the sixth depose the officialist commissioner
After several assemblies held in the centres of population of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, the ejidatarios from the three centres met together in an assembly held on 7thFebruary 7 outside the ejido house of San Sebastián Bachajón. In this assembly it was agreed to dismiss the officialist ejido commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez, and Samuel Díaz Guzmán, president of the vigilance council, for the mismanagement of economic and natural resources, and their formal resignation was demanded. In their place, the ejidatarios declared representatives from each population centre of the ejido: Chich, Alan Sacjun and Bachajón.
The minutes of the meeting were given to the governor of Chiapas, Manuel Velasco Coello, on 9th February in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas, along with other public officials, in order to report the changes occurring in the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón.
The withdrawal of CONANP and public forces are formally demanded
At the assembly, those attending read the agreement approved, on February 11 of 2011, in the city of Tuxtla Gutiérrez by Francisco Jiménez Guzmán then ejidal commissioner and agreed to its cancellation. The agreement, which the ejidatarios never had knowledge of, declared the Treasury of the State of Chiapas to be the sole administrator of the income from the toll booth located at the entrance road to the waterfalls of Agua Azul. The management was undertaken through the National Commission of Natural Protected Areas, beyond the limits of the protected natural area within its jurisdiction and within the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón.
Indeed, that same year CONANP altered the plan of the Natural Protected Area, modifying the limits of the area established by the Decree of 1980, thus violating the territory of the ejidatarios to the benefit of the federal government through the control of the region. In this way they were exerting their activity, despite the warning of the ejidatarios and the report of independent experts from the National Autonomous University of Mexico, showing that they were transgressing the limits of ejido. This exercise of CONANP also meant the continued presence of public forces within the territory of the ejidatarios.
The assembly also agreed the obligation of the former commissioner to hand over the cash box and the audit of the accounts of the toll booth located on the road to Agua Azul. It also decided that from now onwards both the toll booth and the gravel bank would be managed by the ejido representatives of the three centres of population and by the ejidatarios adherents to the Sixth, without the intervention of government authorities.
Collusion between municipal authorities and national government
The interest of the state and national government in controlling the disputed territory needs to be mentioned, since thanks to its natural resources it is proposed as a strategic area for the tourism sector, and therefore a source of income. It is no coincidence that the arrival of the ejido commissioner that is to say, the ejidatarios from the PRI, in Bachajón, took place in 2007, just when the Palenque Integrally Planned Center (CIPP) was introduced. The CIPP is a macroproject for the construction of infrastructure and the equipping of areas for tourist development in the area around Palenque. The entrance of the PRI into the role of ejido commissioner brought new conflicts, including the lack of transparency in the management of the toll booth on the road to Agua Azul. It also created a social divide between pro-government and independent ejidatarios which is heightened day by day through some counterinsurgency strategies of the state. Strategies known as aid programmes, basic food baskets or even the handing over of housing in poor condition to party supporters and voters in order that they remain faithful to the party political leaders, and in extreme cases, that they will participate in forced evictions.
PRI ejidatarios agree to evict the Regional Headquarters
Specifically, an assembly of officialist political leaders and ejidatarios from the PRI decided to evict the Regional Headquarters after Tuesday 10th February if the national public forces had not done so by then. The assembly was held on Sunday 1st February 1 in Bachajon, in the municipality of Chilón and was attended by the officialist ejido commissioner and by several political officers of the PRI from the municipality of Chilón and the region.
In the assembly, the PRI leaders accused the ejidatarios, adherents to the Sixth, and the independent ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón of having regained control of the territory located around the community of Agua Azul, in the ejido San Sebastián. Likewise, the local leaders insisted to the PRI ejidatarios that they themselves should be the ones to evict the organized ejidatarios if the federal government did not do so during the ten-day period ending on Tuesday 10th February. This agreement was made with the complicity and consent of political officers from Yajalón and neighbouring municipalities, and the Undersecretary of Government of the fourteenth region, which includes the municipalities of Chilo, Yajalón, Ocosingo and Tila.
As shown in the photograph, several political officers were present during the making of the agreement, including members of the officialist ejidal commission of San Sebastián Bachajón such as Alejandro Moreno Gómez, ejido commissioner; Samuel Diaz Guzman, from the vigilance council and Manuel Moreno Jiménez, training adviser to the officialists and lawyer to the officialist commissioner of San Sebastián. But also members of neighbouring municipalities such as Oscar Miguel Sánchez Alpuche, undersecretary of government of Yajalón and Francisco Demeza, government delegate of the government of Chilón in the Undersecretariat of government in region XIV.
Precedents in 2011
It would not be the first time that this happened. In February 2011, Carmen Aguilar Gomez and Francisco Guzman Jiménez, the ejidal commissioner at the time, were the officials who led the PRI ejidatarios to evict the organized ejidatarios from the area around Agua Azul. Their intervention was supported by the state government at all times. Proof of this was when the following day, national and state public forces entered the territory and arrested 117 ejidatarios adherents to Sixth under the pretext that it was all an intra-community conflict.
.
***********************************************************
.
Five Lights Amidst The Fog Of The Bachajon Conflict
First Light: the project for a “Cancun for Chiapas”
A “Cancun for Chiapas”, the “Entrance to the Mayan World”, “the Mayan route, the end of an era, for you, a new journey”: all of this in the northern zone of Chiapas, a key location for the economic development plans of the state government. In 2007, media coverage took off with the announcement of the CIPP (Centro Integralmente Planeado Palenque, or “Palenque Holistically Planned Centre), a development that had been mothballed for eight years. The plan aimed to bring together a series of mega projects, taking in the waterfalls at Agua Azul and Misol Ha, the beaches at Catazaja, the Mayan ruins at Palenque and the surrounding Lacandon Forest. The concept included not only hotel developments, a theme park, golf course and residential and commercial development, but also an airport for Palenque (opened in 2014) and a motorway connecting San Cristobal de Las Casas and Palenque. This development prospect would affect at least seven municipalities in Chiapas: Catazajá, Chilón, Ocosingo, Salto de Agua, Tumbalá and Palenque.
| LINKSInformation obtained in a Point of Order in the federal senate, regarding the progress of the overall mega project as of 2010 (in Spanish) |
http://sil.gobernacion.gob.mx/Archivos/Documentos/2010/10/asun_2690699_20101014_1287105872.pdf
Article in Spanish on the proposed San Cristobal – Palenque highway
Article in English from the Financial Times about the Agua Azul conflict
http://www.cgtchiapas.org/sites/default/files/mexicoparadiseindisputeft.com_.pdf
There is however an obstacle in in the way of these projects and their implementation, one which also lies between the ambitions of hotel and construction companies and the abundant nature of the region. This obstacle is the ancestral territory and the ejidos of the indigenous peoples of the region, in particular the Tseltal Mayans of San Sebastian Bachajon.
The Second Light: Ejido Territories and Defending the Land
It’s enough to flick through the novel Balun Canan to get a sense of the contempt of the colonisers, as well as the struggle for the land, which has been the experience of the Tseltal people for 522 years. After the Mexican revolution of 1910, land was redistributed to peasants through the communal structure of the ejido. This was also achieved after the 1994 Zapatista uprising, when indigenous people across Chiapas managed to recover other lands from the hands of big land-owners.
Today, these ejidos and communally-owned territories still exist. Some are forest; others are used for cattle ranching or for the cultivation of maize or coffee.
The Tseltal people of San Sebastian Bachajon were late in obtaining official recognition for the lands of their ejido, which only took place in 1980. The ejido’s lands cover around 70,000 hectares, making it one of the largest ejidos in the country. As in all ejidos, power to make decisions over any part its territory lies only with the ejido’s general assembly. The position of ejido commissioner (today occupied by Alejandro Moreno Gomez) has a role limited to executing decisions made by that assembly.
The current conflict in the ejido dates back to the launch of the CIPP project, and worsened with an armed eviction that took place on 2 February 2011. This was carried out by a group from the villages of Pamala and Xanil, headed by Manuel Jimenez Moreno and Juan Alvaro Moreno respectively, with the support of around 800 state and federal police. Following this, in March 2011 Franciso Guzman Jimenez, ex-commissioner of the San Sebastian Bachajon ejido, made an agreement with ministers from the government of ex-Governor of Chiapas, Juan Sabines Guerrero and with representatives of the village of Agua Azul, which handed over an area of land to the Chiapas state government and to the National Commission for Natural Protected Areas (CONANP, from its initials in Spanish). Under this agreement a tollbooth was set up on the road leading to the waterfalls, at the point where the ejido’s lands border those of neighbouring Tumbala municipality. None of this was done with the free, informed and prior consent of the ejido members.
In response, ejido members, including women, children and old people, set up their own tollbooth, pledging their support for the Zapatista movement’s Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Forest.
In February 2014, the Los Llanos ejido, located in the municipality of San Cristobal de Las Casas, and inhabited by Tsotsil Mayans, applied for an injunction against the new motorway which had been announced in November the previous year by the state Government Secretary General, Eduardo Ramirez Aguilar, on the grounds that it would affect their lands. In August 2014, an assembly in the ejido of San Jeronimo Bachajon (neighbouring the San Sebastian ejido) gave an emphatic no to the construction of the San Cristobal – Palenque motorway. From these actions arose the Movement for Defence of Life and Territory. On October 12, the Los Llanos ejido celebrated a day of resistance with indigenous peoples from other settlements and organizations, including those from San Sebastian Bachajon.
Third Light: Aggression and Violence by the State
Juan Vazquez Guzman, spokesman and coordinator of the Supporters of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Forest (“La Sexta”), was assassinated on 24 April 2013. The authorities have yet to shed any light on his murder, or to arrest anyone in connection with it. And then on 21 March 2014, Juan Carlos Gomez Silvano, the new coordinator of La Sexta in Bachajon was also murdered.
More than 120 members of this group have been detained by the municipal and state police at various moments since it was founded in 2007. Currently three political prisoners remain incarcerated in State Prison Number 12, at Yajalon, Chiapas: Juan Antonio Gomez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gomez Hernandez.
| LINKS:Tseltal Mayans Arrested and Tortured in Chiapas (in Spanish) http://www.masde131.com/2014/09/y-ahora-apresan-y-torturan-a-tres-tzeltales-de-chiapas-tambien-del-congreso-nacional-indigena/ |
Testimonies of Four Indigenous Prisoners in Chiapas (in Spanish)
http://www.masde131.com/2014/10/tejido-testimonial-de-cuatro-indigenas-presos-en-chiapas/ Tejido testimonial de cuatro presos indígenas en Chiapas
Coinciding with the start of the Festival of Resistance and Rebellions against Capitalism on 21 December 2014, members of La Sexta decided to re-occupy the land where the toll-booth had been installed. On 9 January they were evicted by more than 800 police. Last weekend, they again decided to recover the toll-booth by blocking the Ocosingo – Palenque highway at the turn-off for Agua Azul. This was achieved, at the cost of being attacked with rubber bullets and firing of live ammunition. Helicopters hovered over the area, and over the houses of La Sexta members, taking photos. At the current moment, according to the available information, police and persons linked to the ejido commissioner have control of the Agua Azul waterfalls.
Fourth Light: Legal Battles Occurring alongside Territorial Defence
No-one has consulted them, no-one has asked if they need, or are in agreement with the planned mega-projects. Not to speak of respecting the autonomy that they have over their ancestral lands. For this reason the legal defence of Bachajon is based on agrarian law, on Convention 169 of the International Labour Organization, on the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and on Chiapas’s Law for Dialogue, Conciliation and A Dignified Peace. These grant indigenous peoples the right to free, informed and prior consent in relation to their lands and natural resources, and the right to free determination of their affairs, among other things.
Mariano Moreno Guzman, an elderly member of the community and an ex-ejido commissioner who was one of the ejido members who secured the original registration of its lands, has represented the community in a legal appeal (case reference 274/2011) to the Seventh District Judge in Tuxtla Gutierrez, the state capital of Chiapas. On 29 September last year the Third Collegiate Tribunal in Tuxtla ruled in favour of sending the dispute for adjudication to the federal Supreme Court, noting the following:
“The appeal is justified on the grounds that its legal case seeks to defend the collective rights of the community against the complicity of the ejido commissioner with the expropriatory acts of the federal government and State of Chiapas. Various claims are made in it, including denial and lack of access to justice by indigenous peoples, their right to be consulted, and the need for their free, prior and informed consent”.
On 19 November, the Second Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice, decided not to accept the case. As a result, the case was returned to the Third Collegiate Tribunal in Tuxtla Gutierrez so that this body could rule on the issue of the alleged violations of indigenous people’s rights.
Fifth Light: Counter Propaganda and the Free Press on the Bachajon Case
Various media in Chiapas have visited Bachajon to research news stories and documentaries on what is going on there. Websites such as Koman Ilel, Kolectivo Zero and Pozol, as well as Subversiones and Radio Zapote (in addition to other networks) have published bulletins, videos and photos about the area. Members of La Sexta in Bachajon have also worked with the Movimiento por Justicia del Barrio in New York, as this organisation has supported the ejido since 2011, maintaining a blog for denunciations, petitions and opinion pieces (see https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com/).
A year ago Másde131 [which originally published this article in Spanish] made a documentary which explains the wider context [available at this link in Spanish; English subtitles can also be selected when viewing the video] The Struggle for Life and Death at the Agua Azul Waterfalls.
Translated by Fionn O’Sullivan
http://www.masde131.com/2015/01/cinco-luces-del-conflicto-en-bachajon-y-las-cascadas-de-agua-azul/
.
********************************************************
.
Communiqué From San Sebastián Bachajón February 14 2015
San Sebastián Bachajón denounces the creation of false crimes of highway assault and organized crime to undermine their struggle
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 14 FEBRUARY 2015
To the General Command of the Clandestine Indigenous Revolutionary Committee of the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras, we inform you that the bad government is using a strategy of supposed tourist businesses to create an environment of persecution against indigenous communities, but especially of our organization, through false accusations of assault on the highway and organized crime, in order to undermine our struggle by presenting us as thieves or criminals, for this reason they are increasingly sending police to our region of San Sebastian, which is near the Agua Azul turning on the road from Ocosingo to Palenque, because they can find no way to stop us defending our territory and as they see that more and more of the brother and sister ejidatarios are opening their eyes to the bad policy of the government and therefore leaving increasingly more isolated the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gomez and the vigilance councillor Samuel Diaz Guzman, who have no one to embrace them but their patrons the bad governments.
This trick of the bad government to accuse us of false crimes of assault and organized crime is the same as in 2009 and 2011, when they imprisoned the political prisoner compañeros for defending the land, but we are not afraid of the government’s threats, we demand that the three levels of bad government respect the people and organized communities, because we will not rest in the defence of the land and our rights as a people.
We demand the withdrawal of the public forces from our lands which have been dispossessed since February 2011 and of the National Commission for Protected Natural Areas.
We demand freedom for our political prisoners Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández and for the unjustly imprisoned compañeros Santiago Moreno Pérez, Emilio Jiménez Gómez and Esteban Gómez Jiménez.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas, the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón send our combative greetings.
Never again a Mexico without us
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the disappeared compañeros from Ayotzinapa!
JUSTICE FOR AYOTZINAPA, ACTEAL, ABC, ATENCO!
.
***************************************************
.
National And International Brigade Visits The Ejido Bachajón
Agencia SubVersiones
Photos: Koman Ilel, Daniel (Piratas for TM), Patxi, Valk and R.Rahal.
Following the violent eviction on 9th January last, when state forces dispossessed the camp set up on the recuperated land of the ejido (on 21st December 21, 2014), the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón -adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle- together with independent ejidatarios established a new regional headquarters; located in a part of the territory which was taken from them in 2011, in order to develop tourist mega projects.
On 9th February, at the end of the work of the brigade and one month since the eviction, it was reported that the ejidatarios affiliated to the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) in the same municipality announced that if no action was taken within ten days by the police, they themselves would undertake the eviction; the deadline expired on Tuesday 10th February.
The work of the brigade
As they were targeting them again with the threat of another violent eviction, on 6th, 7th and 8th February, a national and international observation brigade in solidarity with San Sebastián Bachajón convened by the Network Against Repression and for Solidarity (RvsR) was undertaken. The participants were thirty-three people belonging to different groups and organizations from Mexico, Italy, France, Spain and Argentina and from the free (autonomous, alternative or whatever they’re called) media.
Night was falling when the brigade was received in the new regional headquarters. Lighted by torches and bonfires, a double row of compañeros and compañeras from the ejido offered a few words and some dinner to the newly arrived members of the brigade. It was not until the next morning that a formal start was made to the work of the committees. In a first sharing a historical account was given from the official establishment of the ejido, in 1980, when the files that defined the communal lands and property which was granted were received. It was in 2004 when the National Commission of Natural Protected Areas (CONANP) changed the boundaries of the ejido lands arbitrarily.
In this way began the process of struggle that led to the adherence of much of the ejido to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, during the other campaign, which also began as a result of repression by the state. In 2009, the first eight ejidatarios were imprisoned; in 2011 the eviction of the toll booth at Agua Azul, which was administered by the ejido was carried out. At that time 117 people were detained, who reported having been tortured and beaten after having experienced a violent eviction, they were gradually released in an operation of punishment and bullying.
The work of the brigade included the documentation of the problems and sharing the everyday work of the men, women and children in the community to learn deeply how their lives have been affected by the theft, violence and aggression. To do this various committees were formed, whose aim was to accompany the different tasks of the compañeros of San Sebastián Bachajón, such as security and the kitchen.
On Saturday 7th February, a committee from “El otro Valle de Chalko” came to the community and created a mural on one of the fences of the headquarters in a show of solidarity and support.
The work of the brigade continued until Sunday 8th in a farewell ceremony. The RvsR gave a banner to show support and representatives of Bachajón spoke words of thanks to the members of the brigade, reiterating the need for solidarity and support in this continuing struggle.
“The land is a victim”
The State and the “officialist” ejidatarios (affiliated with the PRI) try to exercise terror towards the dignified inhabitants of San Sebastián Bachajón to put an end to their struggle. At a meeting of the brigade with relatives of the political prisoners and the assassinated the word was clear: the fight to defend our Mother Earth will continue.
In this brief but powerful encounter, relatives of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, killed in 2013 and 2014 respectively, shared their stories and pain. They alleged that Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano was accused of murdering his brother and was serving a sentence on a charge of attempted murder.
About this case, their father said: “My son was murdered, for the conflict about the ejido land (he) received more than twenty shots while traveling in his truck, my son Juan Antonio was imprisoned in Yajalon. It is for the defence of Mother Earth and the territory that the officialists and the bad government do not want to see us organized, why they kill and send our compañeros to jail.”
Also present were relatives of Emilio Jiménez Gómez, accused of robbery with violence of a foreign tourist who at the time of the confrontation did not recognize Emilio as the attacker but despite this, he was forced to sign a statement that he was not allowed to read. Esteban Gómez Jiménez, prisoner in el Amate, is charged with murder, robbery, possession of weapons and organized crime.Santiago Moreno Perez has spent five years in prison for manslaughter. Mario Aguilar (along with Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano) was arrested at Virgen de Dolores and in the same way was accused on charge of attempted murder, both were threatened and tortured by the police.
It should be noted that governmental strategies for the imprisonment and murder of those who make them uncomfortable are woven together between authorities and companies. The tourism and transport industries seek to acquire land and build megaprojects that only exploit the land and its native inhabitants. The offences are alleged initially by companies and later, despite not being ratified, are used to prosecute and imprison.
http://subversiones.org/archivos/113633
.
***********************************************************
.
Report From The Brigade Of Observation About The Situation In San Sebastián Bachajón
National and international brigade visits San Sebastián Bachajón and reports that the Regional Headquarters is in danger of eviction
The ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón who are organized in defence of their lands are threatened with eviction from the new Regional Headquarters of San Sebastián Bachajón in the coming days. Political party-supporting ejidatarios from the same municipality announced that if public forces do not execute the eviction within ten days, ending on Tuesday 12 February, they themselves will do it. This was explained by compañeros and compañeras from the Network against Repression (RvsR), and other groups who participated between the 6th and 8th of this month in a brigade of observation to San Sebastián Bachajón.
In a sharing on Monday 9th February, many brigadistas told various free media in San Cristobal de las Casas of the current situation of the struggle in the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón as well as the experiences they shared with the compañer@s ejidatari@s.
Listen to the audio of the sharing: http://komanilel.org/2015/02/09/informe-brigada-de-observacion-sobre-la-situacion-en-san-sebastian-bachajon/
The brigade of observation accompanies the ejidatarios of Bachajón
The brigade was composed of 33 people from various countries and four free media from different locations in Mexico. Participants accompanied the ejidatarios in struggle for three days. In addition they addressed the conflict through interviews about different subjects, conducted a questionnaire to report the current situation of the ejidatarios, painted several murals in the facilities of the new Regional Headquarters and collaborated on cooking tasks and security. The short time of the sharing allowed both the members of the brigade and the Tseltales to share their experiences and find together an everyday and closer context. Also, relatives of political prisoners of the struggle and relatives of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano shared their experiences and emotions with the brigade. It was also moving when the RvsR gave the Headquarters a banner with the slogan: “Justice and freedom for Bachajón, the Compañeros are not alone, the Sixth Lives,” at the time of departure.
Ejidatari@s welcome the brigade and explain the historical process of the struggle
During the welcome, the compañer@s from San Sebastián Bachajón who were present lined up to receive the brigade. During this time, the national and international brigadistas were presented and the ejidatari@s gave a brief historical account of the process of struggle for the defence of the ejido San Sebastián. During their presentation they explained how the conflict began in 2004, when the National Commission for Protected Natural Areas (CONANP) changed and violated the boundaries of the area that supposedly belongs to the national government, reducing the territory of the ejidatarios. A year later, the ejidatarios and ejidatarias decided together with the ejidal commissioner to install a toll booth at the entrance road to the waterfalls of Agua Azul, which was managed transparently by the whole community. In 2007, however, a new ejidal authority was imposed illegally, who is linked to the political parties. This act drove the ejidatarios who were not party members to create their own commissioner and control committee. Government repression began at this time through imprisonment and murder. They also explained the current situation following the recovery of lands since 21st December, the subsequent eviction on January 9, the road block and the construction of the Regional Headquarters.
Meeting with the families of the political prisoners and of those who were killed
During the visit of the brigade, relatives of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano talked with the compañeros and shared their feelings. Also, relatives of political prisoners explained how public forces with the complicity of the authorities have been creating crimes and imprisoning people who are not to their liking. Such is the case of Esteban Gomez Jimenez, who is in el Amate and accused of homicide, robbery, possession of weapons and organized crime. Similarly the case of Emilio Jiménez Gómez, accused of robbery with violence of a foreigner who never identified him as guilty and who was then forced to sign documents by police which he could not even read. At the meeting they also remembered the three compañeros imprisoned in Yajalón accused of shooting someone during the celebration of el grito in their community. Finally they also spoke of Santiago Moreno Pérez, who has spent five years in prison and is accused of murder. In addition, the brigade collected the cases of Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano and Mario Aguilar, held in Our Lady of Sorrows, who have been formally arrested for attempted murder. Both were tortured by police and threatened.
.
*********************************************************
.
| Tensions Maintained In San Sebastián Bachajón |
by SIPAZ
On 29 January, ejidatarios from San Sebastián Bachajón, Chilón municipality, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandona Jungle, published a communique which reports that they will maintain their posture of defending their lands and that, toward this end, they have installed a regional headquarters for the ejido between the Agua Azul crossroads at the entrance of the waterfalls of the same name and the limits of the Tumbalá municipality.
They denounced furthermore that since the displacement operation they suffered on 9 January 2015, police presence has been constant, such that they have called on Governor Manuel Velasco Coello to immediately order the withdrawal of public security forces and to discontinue intimidation and repression.
They reported as well that the ejidal commissioner, Alejandro Moreno Gómez, together with his security advisor are organizing shock-groups that “fire into the night with high-caliber weapons,” thus frightening local residents.
They noted lastly that “private meetings are being held between the Chilón delegate Francisco Demeza Hernández and Carlos Jiménez Trujillo, a local deputy, to plan for [more] looting, such that our comrades are guarding the regional headquarters and are charging the quotas at the entrance of the Agua Azul waterfalls. We hold the three levels of government responsible for any type of attack or confrontation that could develop.”
For his part, the “official” ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón, Alejandro Moreno Gómez, has told the media that “at present we are being affected by a group of approximately 100 persons, men and women who hail from different municipalities of the state of Chiapas, adherents to an organization called the Other Campaign or the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandona Jungle, who have violently appropriated ejidal lands […]. We demand respect for the autonomy of the ejido and for non-violence. They must put down their arms and opt for the path of dialogue and social peace.”
The first report of the caravan of adherents to the Sixth who went to visit San Sebastián Bachajón ein January stresses the attempt made by the ejidal commissioner to “portray these events as an inter-communal conflict that only has to do with the internal politics of the Bachajón community rather than the interests of the government and tourist firms.”
https://sipazen.wordpress.com/2015/02/10/chiapas-tensions-maintained-in-san-sebastian-bachajon/
.
****************************************************************
.
Indigenous Resistance Against A Tourist Megaproject At Bachajón
Ricardo Lagunes and Jessica Davies
La Jornada, 7th February, 2015
The dignified struggle of the indigenous Tseltal peoples of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, in defence of their ancestral lands, culture, tradition and identity has become almost legendary. They have suffered the assassination of two of their community leaders –Juan Vázquez Guzmán, on 24th April, 2013, and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, 21st March, 2014–, along with violence, torture, unjust imprisonment, forced disappearance, attacks, threats, harassment, intimidation and a continual police presence, but their determined resistance against the dispossession of their territory for the construction of a tourist megaproject continues.
On 21st December, 2014, more than 400 ejidatarios peacefully recuperated their common lands which had been illegally stolen from them on 2nd February, 2011 by the three levels of government and their local supporters. The date of the recuperation was highly symbolic: the second anniversary of the Silent March of the Zapatistas, and the day of the inauguration of the World Festival of Resistances and Rebellions, convoked by the CNI and the EZLN.
The lands dispossessed by the government are crossed by the access road to the ecotourism centre at the spectacular Agua Azul waterfalls, located in the Tumbalá municipality, which are surrounded by beautiful jungle rich in wildlife and natural resources. For this reason, the governments and corporations are desperate to get their hands on these lands, so that they can create an elite tourist development with luxury hotels, golf courses, and a superhighway. But the lands legally and legitimately belong to the ejidatarios as indigenous peoples who work them communally.
The lands of Bachajón are legally protected by the suspension of the plan granted under amparo 274/2011. The legal resolution of this amparo is to be decreed in the coming weeks, and is very likely that a judgement will be issued which is favorable to the protection of the collective rights of the indigenous. It is important to emphasise that the ejidatarios have chosen to take the legal and peaceful route, and that they have always sought dialogue within the local communities.
For 18 days and nights, in rotation, 500 women, men, young and old people, formed cordons guarding their recuperated territory. They faced threats and intimidation, and a continual fear of attack and eviction by the security forces and paramilitary groups organised by the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez and the vigilance councillor Samuel Díaz Guzmán.
In the early morning of 9th January, 2015, more than 900 members of the state and federal forces violently evicted the ejidatarios from their lands, forcing many to flee to the hills and forests. Denouncing the attack, the ejidatarios confirmed that it would only strengthen their resistance.
On 11th January, 2015, the indigenous from San Sebastián Bachajón, as a sign of protest and peaceful resistance, blocked the road from Ocosingo to Palenque at the Agua Azul turning. The Chiapas state police fired shots at the ejidatarios for twenty minutes with rubber and heavy calibre bullets. Three people were wounded. In spite of this, after an hour of resistance, the ejidatarios succeeded in driving back the government forces, and have maintained their presence up to now.
The ejidatarios and their compañeros throughout the world have stated that they hold the three levels of government responsible for any aggression against their lives or personal integrity as a result of their actions in defence of the mother earth. They are currently standing firm in their dignified struggle, and are calling for national and international solidarity and actions of support. An example of these actions is the Worldwide Forum held on 18th January at Cideci Unitierra, in San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas.
In a communique of 10th January 2015, the ejidatarios explained clearly what drives their struggle: “We want to tell the bad government (…) that our lands are not for sale; they will not conduct their great ecotourism businesses and super highways on our territory, we will not allow them to displace communities and increase poverty just so they can become richer at the expense of our suffering.”
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2015/02/07/opinion/013a1pol
.
**************************************************************
.
Communiqué from the Ejido San Sebastían Bachajón, 5th February, 2015.
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 5th FEBRUARY 2015.
To the Good Government Juntas
To the General Command of the Clandestine Indigenous Revolutionary Committee of the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras, we denounce the three levels of bad government because we have reports that they are preparing arrest warrants to disappear our organization and evict us from the new regional headquarters of San Sebastian, where we have our space for work, workshops and sharings, because the bad government does not us like to have this space of rebellion, because we clearly denounce their cunning in wanting to deprive the people of their territory, but once and for all we are telling the bad government that we will defend the regional headquarters and we will continue to defend the land that has been dispossessed since 2nd February, 2011, and which now is again being held by the public forces since the violent eviction of 9th January, 2015.
The struggle of the organization does not rest, we continue walking to open the eyes of new compañeros and compañeras, brothers and sisters of San Sebastián Bachajon, every day more are joining to defend the lands of the community, because the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gomez and his vigilance councillor Samuel Diaz Guzman no longer have ejidatarios to support them, they only have the backing of the bad government and their public forces like the good minions of the bad government walk around begging for the eviction of the organization, but also the bad government uses its cunning and gives them weapons so that at any time they can come to kill us, and secretly advises the government delegate of Chilon, Francisco Demeza, and the government undersecretary of Yajalón Alpuche, former adviser to the paramilitary organization Peace and Justice, so the bad government washes its hands saying the problem is between indigenous and they are killing each other, and for this reason it then sends its public forces to take away their lands, it is the same plan as always.
The bad government and its minions the ejidal commissioner and the vigilance councillor say in the paid media, to those who believe nothing but the word of the bad government, that we are robbers and criminals and that we have guns, that we are a minority in the ejido and that there are people here from other municipalities. With these words the bad government are only looking for a pretext to detract from our struggle, but our word and struggle has more strength because it comes from dignity and the love of life, of the land, our struggle is not for ourselves, it is for our children, for our grandchildren to come, because we have the right to defend and care for the land, to be autonomous and to decide what is the best way to live as a people, we do not need political parties, neither do we need the bad government to come to tell us what to do because the bad government is domineering and only seeks its own benefit, just like peña nieto, the “blondie” Velasco and Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, each one has their millionaire households of corruption, their wives contracted to be televised, they are only looking to make their moneybags richer, and the municipal President of Chilon, who is living in one of the poorest municipalities in Chiapas, sells weapons, is a drug dealer and is now becoming a deputy as a reward for being a servant of those from above.
We demand that the bad government respect our people and organization because we will defend life and territory, our organization struggles peacefully because we are original peoples of these lands and we have rights that they cannot just come and take away like this with their police and paramilitaries.
We demand the freedom of our compañeros political prisoners, and demand respect for the people and communities in resistance against the projects of death through which they want to take away the water, earth, air, life, and culture of our people. We greet the struggle of our compañeros and compañeras of Xochicuautla, Coyotepec, San Pedro Tlanixco, Atenco, ejido Tila, Alvaro Obregon, El Barrio in New York and all the peoples and communities in resistance in Mexico and the world.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas, the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón send our combative greetings.
Never again a Mexico without us
Attentively
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the disappeared compañeros from Ayotzinapa!
JUSTICE FOR AYOTZINAPA, ACTEAL, ABC, ATENCO!
.
***************************************************
.
Tourist Development Behind State Repression Of Non-Violent Indigenous Movement
By Martha Pskowski
“We organized to take this land. Why? Because we know that the government is dispossessing land all over the country. On December 21stwe woke up at 6am to recuperate this land. Four hundred of us compañeros and compañeras from the community arrived.”
The masked representative of San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, describes in a Jan. 1 interview how residents of this Tzeltal indigenous community reclaimed the entrance to the Aguas Azules waterfalls on Dec. 21, 2014. Government officials at the tollbooth handed over the building without resistance to the non-violent indigenous movement led by the residents of San Sebastian Bachajon.
Movement members set up an encampment at the tollbooth, where over one hundred people remained on guard at all hours. However on Jan. 9, 2015, several hundred state and federal police evicted them from the encampment to regain control of the tollbooth. This triggered a new series of confrontations with the movement in Bachajón. Currently the state has control of the tollbooth, but the movement has resolved to continue organizing to defend the tollbooth and their entire territory against state encroachments.
“Cancún in the jungle”
Bachajon’s territory borders the famous Aguas Azules (Blue Waters) waterfalls, a major tourist attraction in Chiapas. The local community has been fighting to maintain their territorial rights as an indigenous community against incursions by the state government, which intends to develop the site as an international tourist attraction.
The Aguas Azules falls lie between the municipalities of Chilón and Tumbalá, Chiapas. They form part of a state-wide tourism development plan that successive governments have tried to implement, going back to Governor Robeto Albores Guillén, who created the “Comitan Declaration” in 2006 promising to, “Build a new Cancún in Northern Chiapas.”
The declaration lays out a broad plan for the area. “They did it in Quintana Roo and it is possible in Chiapas. The Federal Government should commit to develop a tourism program in the coming years that includes Palenque, Agua Azul, Misol-ha, Toniná, Yaxchilán, Bonampak and Playas de Catazajá.”
This regional strategy coincides closely with the Plan Puebla-Panamá, renamed the Mesoamerica Project, of which Chiapas is a pilot state. The development of Aguas Azules is part of the “Palenque Integral Planned Center”. The Center would include a luxury hotel at the waterfalls, an international airport in Palenque and construction of the Palenque-San Cristóbal highway. The development would bring immense environmental degradation, pollution, and land grabbing to the region.
All of these development projects include language about poverty reduction, protecting nature and fostering economic growth, but the communities that live in the areas destined for mega-tourism are taken into account only as low-level service employees or folklore for the visitors. Chiapas’s state tourism website has a video of the Aguas Azules waterfalls, displaying a virgin landscape devoid of any human presence. It only includes one short note on the “cultural aspects” of the site: “The indigenous Tzeltal people live here and preserve their traditional dress, especially the women.”
TRhe residents of Bachajón know what lies behind the discourse of a development scheme that reduces the complex cultural fabric of the communities of Chilón and Tumbalá to their traditional clothing. Referring to the hotel slated to be built in their territory, a representative says, “It won’t benefit us. They won’t let us work there when they build the hotel. They are going to use us a service people, nothing more, just to wash the bathrooms and pick up trash.”
Popular support grows for the autonomy movement in Bachajon
For two weeks in December and early January, the Zapatista movement of southern Mexico, along with Mexico’s National Indigenous Congress and the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, held the first ever “World Festival of Resistances and Rebellions.” Participants came from around Mexico and around the world. The movement in Bachajon adheres to the Sixth Declaration, a call the Zapatistas issued in 2006 to unite movements worldwide against neoliberalism and for autonomy in local communities. They took part in the Festival, which was inaugurated in Central Mexico the same day the movement in Bachajon reclaimed a part of their territory. They called for Festival participants to support their efforts for autonomy and encouraged alternative media collectives to visit the community.
The battle for Bachajon did not begin with the latest conflict. Since 2006 community members have organized to reject the tourism development that forges ahead without respecting the basic rights of indigenous peoples to consultation and consent for projects in their territories.
Bachajon is an ejido, the form of communal land ownership founded after the Mexican Revolution, and maintains a local government that is legally required to hold assemblies and include all residents who have land rights. However, the movement’s representatives say that the local government, led by Alejandro Moreno Gómez, “Never holds assemblies, never reports on their activities, there isn’t access to information… …they don’t tell us how much money is being collected at the tollbooth.”
Due to these complaints, in recent months more community members have joined the resistance movement and no longer recognize the legitimacy of the local government, which acts in cahoots with the state officials who have violently attempted to take over the tourist site.
Although a growing number of residents support the movement, another part of the community supports Moreno Gómez and the activities of the state government. This group maintains ties to paramilitaries in the area, and staged a blockade on the highway Dec. 31. A representative of the autonomous movement says, “It is a tactic to give the state authorities a pretext to enter and not only remove the blockade, but remove those of us who have re-taken the tollbooth.”
While the government’s discourse insists that the conflict in Bachajon is an intra-community dispute in which the government serves as mediator, in the interview residents explain how the local, state and national governments have acted in collusion with sectors of the community. These actions not only justify the displacement of the community, but also the repression that has reinforced it.
Criminalizing of the struggle for autonomy
After ten days guarding the entrance to the community and the tollbooth, on January 9 at 6.30 am, more than 900 members of the state and federal forces violently evicted the encampment. During the attack, eight residents of San Sebastián Bachajon were apprehended and held without knowledge of their whereabouts for over eight hours before being released. After the eviction, ten police vehicles remained at the site to prevent a recuperation by the autonomous movement.
The next day, Jan. 11, the opposing group blockaded the Ocosingo-Palenque highway, one of the most important tourist and transit routes in Chiapas. When police arrived, the movement succeeded in driving them off with sticks, machetes, and slingshots. Meanwhile, the police shot back with rubber bullets and firearms. Only three residents of Bachajon were mildly wounded, but bullet casings scattered the highway after the attack.
On Jan. 12, a police helicopter was spotted flying over the near-by community of Xanil. The occupants were taking photographs of houses below, making residents concerned more state or paramilitary attacks against movement leaders could follow.
That afternoon, more than five police vehicles, with 160 officers, approached the blockade but were forced back by trees that the autonomous movement had felled to block the highway. Meanwhile, a paramilitary group under the direction of ejido authorities used an alternative route, effectively surrounding the blockade. While their presence did not lead to direct confrontation, ultimately the movement decided to lift the blockade. Since the blockade has been lifted, the autonomous movement in Bachajon has travelled to San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas, to provide information on recent events to solidarity organizations, and invited international observers to the community. On February 2, 2015, they announced the opening of a new regional centre for the Sixth Declaration in the community of Bachajon.
January’s confrontation is not the first act of repression against the movement. State police and paramilitaries have violently repressed the movement for autonomy in San Sebastian Bachajon, in a strategy that has been characterized as low intensity warfare. The repression began in full in February 2011, when police descended on a community meeting, detaining 117 community members, all affiliated with the movement for autonomy. The government took over the toll booth and since then the total number of arrests has continued to grow. Of these 117, some were quickly released, while others spent months or more than a year in jail. The final two prisoners were not released until December 2013. Other former prisoners from the community are Miguel Vázquez and Antonio Estrada, both adherents to the Sixth Declaration, who were released in December 2014.
The most recent unlawful arrests were on September 16, 2014, when Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano (whose brother Juan Carlos was assassinated), Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández were taken into custody. They are still imprisoned and report that they were tortured after being detained.
Two members of the movement for autonomy have been killed, without charges being brought against the perpetrators. Juan Vázquez Guzmán was murdered at the door of his home on Abril 24, 2013 and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano was killed on March 21, 2014. Community members say paramilitaries in the area murdered the campesinos and although a national and international solidarity campaign has called for justice, the cases have not been resolved.
This repression is not a coincidence or collateral damage–it is an integral part of the tourism developers’ strategy. The Human Rights Center Fray Bartolome de las Casas (FrayBa) in San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, leaked documents from the U.S.-based tourism consulting company Norton Consulting and EDSA that recommend that, “The state and local government need to assure that the tourists who visit Chiapas and Palenque feel safe and protected” and that “the state needs to protect the developers and hotel operators from the perception of political instability”.
These documents are reminiscent of the famous memo from Chase Bank in Manhattan, which stated that the Mexican government had to, “Eliminate the Zapatistas to demonstrate their effective control of the national territory.” The repression of social movements in Chiapas goes part and parcel with the efforts to development mega-tourism in the state.
Fighting for their land and territory
On Jan. 1, the representative of the movement giving the interview keeps his face covered with a ski-mask for fear of violent retaliation for speaking up. The dense rainforest surrounding Bachajon lies in the heart of territory that the Zapatista movement reclaimed in 1994 from large-scale landholders. Their territory is close to the magnificent Mayan archeological site of Palenque and the waves of national and foreign tourism that descend on the region. Mayan culture, memorialized at Palenque, is alive and well in Bachajón. The residents of Bachajón, who speak the Mayan language of Tzeltal, defend their territorial rights so they will be able to maintain their livelihoods practicing subsistence agriculture.
The representative explains that to the people fighting to remain autonomous know as campesinos, or peasants, plans for a luxury hotel in their territory will not benefit them. The tourists who drive by the encampment do not look worried or scared as they pass local residents lining the highway with ski-masks covering their faces. Perhaps in the era of the state disappearance of 43 students from Ayotzinapa, Guerrero and the military execution of 22 in the town of Tlatlaya in June, the camouflaged trucks of the Mexican Army–a common site in Chiapas–provoke more fear than campesinos fighting for their livelihoods.
Mainstream media typically describes the conflict as centering on the tollbooth, but the land recuperation that took place on Dec. 21 and the ongoing resistance reveals a much broader territorial vision.
As one representative says, “We aren’t just concerned with the tollbooth. What we want is the land, because the land provides our food and is where we work to earn a living.” While the government once again controls the Aguas Azules tollbooth, the resolve of the movement for local autonomy has not flagged after more than seven years of struggle.
Martha Pskowski is a researcher and freelance journalist in Mexico and a member of the Americas Program team. This article was originally published in Spanish with the Mexican news collective SubVersiones
Photos: Heriberto Paredes, Yollatl Alvarado
http://www.cipamericas.org/archives/14548
http://subversiones.org/archivos/112379
.
****************************************************************
.
Ejidatarios Of San Sebastián Bachajón Continue To Defend Their Territory Against The Threat Of Dispossession From The Government Of Chiapas
After at least 900 federal and state police evicted them, on 9th January, from the lands recuperated on 21st December belonging to the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, the Tseltales have maintained the position of defending their lands; now they have set up a regional headquarters of the ejido between the Agua Azul turning and the boundary with the municipality of Tumbalá.
EDITORIAL Desinformémonos
Mexico City, January 30, 2015. After at least 900 federal and state police evicted them on 9th January from the lands recovered on 21st December belonging to the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, the Tseltales have maintained the position of defending their land; now they have set up a regional headquarters of the ejido between the Agua Azul turning and the boundary with the municipality of Tumbalá.
In the area that connects Ococingo with Palenque and the Agua Azul waterfalls, there is a permanent police presence, so the indigenous demand that the government of Manuel Velasco Coello, Governor of Chiapas, withdraw the members of the police immediately and do not continue with the intimidation and repression.
In 2007, the indigenous from one of the largest ejidos in Mexico, with 70,000 hectares, became part of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, and exercised their right to the free self-determination of their people. They erected a tollbooth on their territory, so that tourists who want to visit the waterfalls of Agua Azul, one of the biggest tourist attractions of this state, pay a toll for entrance. With the money, they decided in assembly, they would support sick ejidatarios and needy families
Both the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez and his vigilance councillor Samuel Díaz Guzmán, from the municipality of Chilón, are organizing shock groups to repress the ejidatarios. “People like Juan Álvaro Moreno and Manuel Jiménez Moreno fire shots at night with high calibre weapons, to foment fear in the population,” report the indigenous in a communiqué.
At the same time they make an appeal to human rights organizations and society in general to be alert to any new eviction. The indigenous report that the delegate of the municipality of Chilón, Francisco Demeza Hernández, and local deputy, Carlos Jimenez Trujillo, are possibly planning repression against the people who guard the new regional house and the toll booth.
.
************************************************
.
Communiqué from San Sebastian Bachajon January 29, 2015
Regional Headquarters San Sebastian Bachajon, communiqué January 29, 2015
Where those from above destroy, we from below reconstruct!
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 29 JANUARY 2015
To the Good Government Juntas
To the General Command of the Clandestine Indigenous Revolutionary Committee of the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras, we inform you that we continue to do the work of resistance defending our people and territory from dispossession by the bad government; for this reason we are building a regional headquarters in San Sebastián to be a place of work, workshops and sharings (exchanges). The work at this headquarters starts today, we have built it a kilometre from the Agua Azul turning and from the border with the official municipality of Tumbalá.
We demand from the bad government that their police leave the lands which have been dispossessed since 2nd February, 2011, because the lands belong to the people and we will not allow them to take them from us for their economic interests.
We demand that the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gomez and vigilance councillor Samuel Diaz Guzmán stop selling their dignity for money like the former commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez did. We denounce that these representatives of the bad government are organizing the groups of Juan Alvaro Moreno from Xanil and Manuel Jiménez Moreno from Pamalá to fire shots at night with high calibre weapons.
And also they are having private meetings with the delegate of Chilón, Francisco Demeza Hernández and Carlos Jiménez Trujillo, local deputy, to plan to displace the compañer@s who are guarding the regional headquarters and those who are collecting the toll at the entrance to the Agua Azul waterfalls; and we hold the three levels of government responsible for any type of attacks or confrontations that may take place.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas, the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón send our combative greetings to all the peoples, communities and organisations in resistance, never again a Mexico without us.
ATTENTIVELY
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the disappeared compañeros from Ayotzinapa!
JUSTICE FOR AYOTZINAPA, ACTEAL, ABC, ATENCO!
.
***********************************************************
.
Words of the compañeros and compañeras of San Sebastián Bachajón in the Forum against Urban and Rural Dispossession
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO
18th JANUARY, 2015
To the Good Government Juntas
To the General Command of the Clandestine Indigenous Revolutionary Committee of the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the World Festival of Resistances
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras, on 21 December 2014 the men and women from San Sebastián Bachajón peacefully recuperated the common use lands dispossessed by the bad government, and the bad government responded with repression because they could not see the communities remain owners of their lands, because this would prevent the imposition of the death projects of the rich.
As we have reported through various media, on 9th January the bad government sent more than 900 police to evict the women and men guarding the recuperated lands. The same day eight compañeros were disappeared for several hours, and despite the violent eviction we decided to stand firm in defence of our lands because if we don’t do it nobody else will.
That’s why on 11th January we began to block the road from Ocosingo to Palenque at the agua azul turning, where we blocked the road for several days to demand the departure of the public security forces from our lands, but the government as always seeks its economic interest and does not care about using the same indigenous brothers to kill our compañeros and compañeras who defend the mother Earth; it ordered the police to shoot us with high calibre guns, as was shared through the independent media with pictures of shell casings, as a result one compañero was wounded by a heavy calibre gun and two compañeros by rubber bullets.
In spite of this police attack the compañeros and compañeras responded with courage and dignity and we maintained a total blockage of the road until a few days ago when the roadblock became intermittent and informative, accompanied by the national and international solidarity of women and men of good heart.
We inform you that our compañeros and compañeras are going to remain in the place where we have been since January 11 until the police leave our lands. We will continue to inform you about the dispossession, because what the bad government is reporting, that we are preventing tourist access to the waterfalls, is not true. We have no connection with any blocking of access to the site promoted by the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez and his vigilance councillor Samuel Díaz Guzmán who are manipulated by the bad government.
We demand that the bad government respects us because we will not allow them to generate violence in the community in order to dispossess us. We hold the three levels of government responsible for what may happen to our compañeros and compañeras as a result of defending the land. Because this is what the bad government is doing with our Ch’ol brothers and sisters of the ejido Tila where the bad government is using these same indigenous brothers to put an end to the community and its autonomy, imposing illegal ejido authorities to remove power from the true ejido authorities who defend the land and rights of their people. We tell the compañeros and compañeras of the Tila ejido and the communities of Mexico and the world who are resisting the projects of dispossession that they are not alone and we are walking together.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas, the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón send our combative greetings.
Never again a Mexico without us
Attentively
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
.
******************************************************
.
“We don’t want dialogue with the government, we just want them off our land”: San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas.
Ejidatarios from San Sebastián Bachajón in Chiapas remain committed to continuing their activities, after the events of January 9, when at least 900 members of federal and state police forced them off the lands they had recuperated on December 21. “They will not desist until state forces leave their lands; they don’t want dialogue with the government”, says lawyer.
DESINFORMÉMONOS
Mexico City, January 13, 2015. Members of the ejido (or ejidatarios) of San Sebastián Bachajón in Chiapas remain committed to continuing with their activities, after the events of January 9, when at least 900 members of federal and state police forced them off the lands they had reclaimed on December 21. “They will not desist until state forces leave their lands; they don’t want dialogue with the government because it is judge, jury and executioner in the conflict and they perceive it as the principal cause of tension in the zone”, explains the lawyer Ricardo Lagunes, legal representative of the Tseltal group. He adds that, for them, the current task is one of internal organization, which has been visibly altered by the violence brought in by the government. “For them organization is difficult, because they have to defend themselves from attacks carried out with high-calibre firearms by the State Police”.
San Sebastián Bachajón is one of the largest ejidos in Mexico, made up of 70 thousand hectares; it is a zone of great biodiversity and natural beauty which political interests perceive as an area with potential for the development of tourism. The land is rich in natural resources, green forest, wildlife and water. The waterfalls of Agua Azul are among the most popular tourist attractions in the state of Chiapas; at certain times of the year, they take on a turquoise hue which makes them even more attractive to foreign tourists.
The Tzeltal ejidatarios maintain an intermittent blockade on the Ocosingo-Palenque highway by the Agua Azul junction, which began on January 11 in response to the violent expulsion carried out by the state government, and members of state and federal police, as a sign of protest at the state’s insistence on appropriating their ejido land.
In 2007, the members of the ejido declared themselves adherents of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, exercising and establishing the right of their people to self-determination. They then erected a toll booth in their territory, with the aim that tourists wanting to visit the waterfalls could pay them a reclamation fee. With the funds raised, they decided in an assembly to use it to support the ill members of the ejido and the families most in need, the journalist Gloría Muñoz explains in her opinion column in the newspaper La Jornada.
In March 2011 ex-governor of Chiapas Juan Sabines Guerrero brought together representatives of the Bachajón ejido, those from the Agua Azul zone and all cabinet members of his state government; they subscribed to a “convention 274” whereby the two peoples would commit to donate those lands to the state so that a single toll booth could be set up. “The state was to govern the highway through the Secretary of Hacienda in Chiapas and the federal government’s Commission for Protected Natural Areas, although the Agua Azul zone isn’t even in this category”, the lawyer explains.
In a lawsuit (amparo) placed by indigenous members of the ejido, they appealed against the convention signed in 2011. “I believe that the members of the ejido have about a 95% chance of obtaining a ruling protecting their collective rights, we are waiting for this ruling because the Third Collegiate Tribunal of Tuxtla Gutiérrez sent the document of appeal in November 2014 to the Supreme Court of Justice laying out the highly relevant reasons that this case should be resolved, and developed into a broader statement about indigenous rights”, Lagunes states. The lawyer adds that these are wider issues that the Court has been reticent to address, even in such important cases as those of the Yaqui tribe in Sonora, who have been fighting against Independencia Aqueduct, a waterway which will dry up a river sacred to the tribe.
The Court, the ejidatarios’ legal representative charges, has focused on the issue of consultation, but has never looked at deeper issues such as autonomy or the self-determination of indigenous peoples. Further, it wants to subject them to the authority of the State; “the indigenous peoples of Mexico, according to the government’s laws, have no rights to be truly respected as such, and are forced into particular political frames without having their rights as natives peoples recognized in any clear and specific manner”, relates Ricardo Lagunes.
The Supreme Court returned the document of appeal to Tuxtla Gutiérrez. For the lawyer it is no coincidence that the minister handling the case, the Chiapanecan Luna Ramos, is one of the most conservative, and he suggests that the decision to return the document was for political, rather than legal, reasons.
With an injunction, the Third Collegiate Tribunal ordered all the authorities of the government of Chiapas not to continue with their forcible eviction of San Sebastián Bachajón. The decision to reclaim lands on December 21 was due in part to a legal foundation giving the community court backing on the matter of their rights: “for the Tzeltal ejido members the legal arguments in their favour give them even more rights to continue defending their struggle and reclaiming their lands”, Lagunes declares.
Yesterday, January 12, around 160 members of the State Police arrived to the community of Xanil, located about five kilometres from the Agua Azul junction. This community is distinguished by having a large presence of groups supportive of the present government; there, as in Pamala, a community at the same distance from the junction but towards Palenque, they are organizing groups of people close to the terrains of conflict in which state police are active. As the lawyer explains, these groups are being organized to reinforce sections of the police in possible evictions.
On the highway that travels to Ocosingo from the Agua Azul zone, there is also a group of people simulating a blockade to put pressure on the government to give in to its demands to forcibly evict the ejidatarios of Bachajón. “For the ejidatarios it is clear that it is the very same government [behind these actions], because it is the government that has the greatest interest in evicting them from their land to eventually exercise power over it”, Lagunes declares.
The current atmosphere in this zone is one of tension. There is a continuous presence of police officers and helicopters, and the indigenous people are convinced that at any moment they will be forced from their land. Confronting this possibility, at the site of the blockade, is a group of international human rights observers who are accompanying the indigenous people, and are attentive to any violation of their rights.
The demand of the inhabitants of Bachajón is that the State and its security forces immediately leave their lands, and that the land commissioner commit to not handing their lands over to the government, as well as that the income made from the Agua Azul zone be managed by the ejido itself and not by a governmental entity. If not, such an entity should operate in a transparent fashion and orient its administration towards providing benefits to the community, Lagunes states.
“We ought to recognize that legal time does not correspond to social time, but perhaps next month there will be a fundamental resolution about the ruling and the violations of human rights on the part of State actors in the forced evictions, [nonetheless theejidatarios] will continue in their struggle, exploiting all possible legal and political channels”, the lawyer Ricardo Lagunes concludes.
Translated by Andrew Green
.
**********************************************
.
Palenque And Agua Azul: The Dispossession Of The Indigenous Peoples Continues
Since 2007 there has been a serious dispute (with injured, detained and so far two deaths) between the Tseltal indigenous of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón and the authorities, who are especially interested in the tourist potential of the territory that is located at the entrance to the Agua Azul Waterfalls on which they plan to build the Palenque Integrally Planned Centre.
JANUARY 16, 2015
Last Friday (January 9) indigenous Tseltales from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, in the municipality of Chilón, Chiapas, were violently evicted by state and federal police from a piece of land which they had recuperated on 21st December, and which had been seized from them in 2011 and before that in 2009. Two days later the ejidatarios blocked the Palenque-Ocosingo road and again were confronted by the state police, who wounded several with rubber bullets. It is not known if at this point the road is still blocked or whether there have been more confrontations, but what is clear is that the conflict over the ejido lands, which started in 2007, continues.
The ejido of Bachajón is located at the entrance to the famous waterfalls of Agua Azul, a place where it has been planned since 2000 to construct the Palenque Integrally Planned Centre, a tourism project promoted by FONATUR which has been halted since 2004, but last year studies for its implementation were resumed and furthermore the Palenque airport was opened.
In 2007 the ejidatarios put a tollbooth at the entrance to their territory to obtain a payment from the tourists visiting the waterfalls which was allocated, by decision of the assembly, to support the neediest families. In 2009 and 2011 they were evicted from the booth and in the last eviction they were also displaced from a large area of communal land, which they took back again in December.
In short, since 2007 there has been a serious dispute (with injured, detained and two deaths so far) among the ejidatarios -adherents to Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle – and the authorities, who have a special interest in that territory for its tourism potential.
The Commission for Dialogue with Indigenous Peoples of Mexico (CDPIM), in its paper entitled “Identified conflicts in indigenous peoples and communities,” of June 2014, has registered this problem as: “Violent dispossession of land of Tseltal ejidatarios of San Sebastian Bachajón, municipality of Chilón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, in order to promote the tourist project at the Agua Azul waterfalls, municipality of Tumbalá.”. That is to say, not only are they aware of it, but they know and recognize that it is for the tourism project. It is one more of the 175 conflicts that appear in the above text and one more among hundreds of others that are not registered, which are facing the indigenous peoples of our country through the dispossession of their lands for megaprojects of various kinds.
In the case of Bachajón it is for the Palenque Integrally Planned Centre, which plans to provide thousands of hotel rooms, shopping centres, a golf course, etc. It is integrally planned for a luxury tourism and profits of millions of pesos for domestic and foreign investors, but without much benefit for the indigenous who inhabit the region.
In other cases, the conflicts are over dispossession to build dams, super-highways, or for mining or windpower companies, etc, which far from benefiting the local populations do them harm and evict them from land which belongs to them. The CDPIM so far has not done much more than register the conflicts. We continue to hope for the laws and the “legislative harmonization” that they announced and offered a year ago, which would help to solve these problems now, but have failed to materialise, I believe, because they go against the interests of big business and its partners and allies, the politicians in power.
@yotlacuila
.
*************************************************
.
Communiqué From The Ejido San Sebastían Bachajón 16th January, 2015
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 16th JANUARY, 2015
To the Good Government Juntas
To the General Command of the Clandestine Indigenous Revolutionary Committee of the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras, we inform you that we continue in the struggle for the defence of our territory and against dispossession by the bad government which is still keeping its police in the lands that belong to us after they attacked our compañeros and compañeras with heavy calibre firearms and rubber bullets. But our compañeros and compañeras with courage and dignity told the minions of the bad government that the lands are not for sale, that we do not want the security forces and violence in our community, we just want to live peacefully, we do not want their projects of death and forced displacement.
We remain peacefully at the Agua Azul turning, spreading the word of the struggle of the ejido to all visitors to the Agua Azul Waterfalls and to people traveling on the road between Ocosingo and Palenque, our organization is allowing the passage of all the people, we disclaim what people in the government and business are saying, they are spreading misinformation about our struggle sowing rumours that the road is closed and that we promote violence, it is the bad government and their police henchmen who sow violence.
We share an invitation to all the compañeros and compañeras to join us on Sunday 18th January at CIDECI for worldwide Forum against dispossession and share our words.
We also want to express our thanks to the international compañeros and compañeras who participated in the caravan that has completed its work, for their good hearts and for accompanying our struggle in times of high tension; their presence was important.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas, the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón send our combative greetings.
Never again a Mexico without us
Attentively
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the 43 missing of Ayotzinapa!
JUSTICE FOR AYOTZINAPA, ACTEAL, ABC, ATENCO!
.
*******************************************
.
Final Report From The Sixth International Caravan In Support Of San Sebastián Bachajón
Sixth International Caravan in Support of San Sebastián Bachajón leaves Bachajon
January 16, 2015
After several very busy days as a result of the persecution on the part of the bad government towards the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, the Sixth International Caravan in Support of San Sebastián Bachajón leaves Bachajón after completing its mission as human rights observers.
During their stay, members of the Sixth International Caravan in Support of San Sebastián Bachajón observed and exposed the absurd aggressiveness displayed by the forces of the bad government in their obsession to comply with the orders of their leaders – who have it all and want it all – to dispossess the Tzeltal indigenous communities of their legitimate lands.
The members of the caravan leave more inspired than ever. They return to their corners of the planet enthusiastic to continue with their local struggles and committed to continue supporting the adherents to the Sixth from San Sebastián Bachajón.
For them it was a great honour to spend these days with a people who struggle with dignity and courage. The members of the Sixth International Caravan in Support of San Sebastián Bachajón return to their corners of struggle with more inspiration than ever. At the same time, they call on people of good heart to remain alert for any possible aggression by the bad government and its henchmen towards the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón.
.
*******************************************************
.
First Report from the Sixth International Caravan on their visit to San Sebastián Bachajón.
Brief Summary of Events in the Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón since the recuperation of their lands on 21st December, 2014
From the “Sixth International Caravan”
On December 21, 2014, during the inauguration of the World Festival of Resistances and Rebellions Against Capitalism in Mexico, compañeros from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón in northern Chiapas, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, announced that in the morning of that same day they had reclaimed the lands which were dispossessed from them on February 2, 2011, by the government of Juan Sabines Guerrero and Noe Castañón León, in complicity with the government-supporting ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez. The participants in the World Festival were asked for their support and solidarity in the defence of their recovered territories.
Approximately 400 women, children, young people, men, and elders peacefully took the common lands in the area of endowment of the ejido, located on the border with the municipality of Tumbalá and near to the access to the Agua Azul Waterfalls ecotourism centre, a place where the Chiapas State and Federal Government built a toll booth operated by the National Commission of Natural Protected Areas (CONANP) and the Ministry of Finance of Chiapas, as well as a Centre of Attention for Emergency Civil Protection and an abandoned supposed medical practice. Their resistance against police and paramilitary repression has lasted for more than six years of struggle. During this period there have been extrajudicial killings such as Juan Vázquez Guzman and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, and the unjust imprisonment of more than 120 compañer@s. Three of them, Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández, still remain in prison, where they have been tortured by the state. These acts of repression by the government have not diminished their conviction to regain their land; on the contrary, this conviction has only been strengthened by the pain suffered because of their fallen compañer@s:
“For all these injustices by the bad government that prefers to see us dead or in prison, living in poverty and marginalization because they have taken away our land to give to corporations and corrupt politicians so they can get richer while our communities die of hunger … for this reason, as an organisation our communities in assembly decided today to recover the lands that were dispossessed from them by the bad government.” – Communiqué from San Sebastián Bachajón, 21st December, 2014
In the days after the initial taking of the lands, they received several threats of eviction and repression on the part of the security forces and paramilitary groups which were organized in cooperation with the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez, and his vigilance councillor, Samuel Díaz Guzmán. On 30th December, representatives of the government of Chiapas demanded that the ejidatarios of the Sixth leave the reclaimed lands in order to enable a dialogue between them and the government-supporting ejidatarios. This demand was accompanied by threats of eviction and arrest should they refuse to leave the reclaimed lands.
Faced with these threats, the compañer@s of Bachajón continued to keep control of the recuperated lands while the traffic of tourists flowed normally. Hundreds of compañer@s in balaclavas guarded the entrance to the waterfalls, which did not seem to trouble the tourists. They never realized that there were 24 hours guards hidden in the trees on both sides of the road, watching to see who was coming. Each person, young and old, woman and man stood guard for three consecutive days without sleep, in shifts of fifteen days in total. In the 18 days of recovery of the lands, the number of compañer@s who came from different villages of ejido increased to more than 500.
On 30th December, between 40 and 50 people, paid and organized by the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez, blocked the roads from San Cristobal-Palenque and San Cristobal-Chilón in the villages of Temó and Pamalá, not only to demand the intervention of the public forces but also to portray these events as an intra-community conflict which only involved the internal politics of the community of Bachajón and not the interests of the Government and tourist enterprises.
On 9th January, at 6.30 am, more than 900 members of the state and federal forces violently evicted the compeñer@s of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón. During the attack, eight people from San Sebastián Bachajón were disappeared and three of them were abducted in an attempt to arrest them, but all managed to free themselves. In a communiqué the same day the ejidatarios denounced the attack:
“The bad government through the government secretary Eduardo Aguilar Ramirez jokes that they have already recovered the toll booth as if it were their property or territory, their real interest is to dispossess our land, they are the real shameless and corrupt traitors to the country, but their bad policies will not put an end to our struggle because we will not let them continue dispossessing us at their pleasure. We will continue our actions in defence of the Mother Earth.”
The next day the free media confirmed the occupation of the lands by the security forces and documented the presence of 10 police trucks, many white trucks full of police in the area of the recovered territories and two police trucks parked on the premises of the Ministry of Security and Civil Protection of the State of Chiapas.
The ejidatarios denounced that accomplices of the state police had threatened the compañeros Jeremiah Hernandez and Francisco Cruz Jimenez Hernandez, from Xanil community, part of the ejido. These compañeros now fear for their lives.
In a communiqué released on 10th January the ejidatarios said that the eviction “does not make our heart sad but fills it with greater courage to strengthen the movement and the defence of the land and territory.” They also requested that all the compañer@s in solidarity remain alert because they had heard “strong rumours” that the police were pointing out their homes in order to arrest them and that they were organizing to evict them from the headquarters of their organization in Nah Choj.
On 11th January the ejidatarios returned to try to retake their lands. At 6.30 am the compañer@s took and blocked the Agua Azul turning. In response the state police at a distance of five hundred metres blocked the road with trees and from the barricade fired at the ejidatarios for twenty minutes. There were two injured by rubber bullets. One of the ejidatarios, who answers to the name of Juan Pérez Moreno, was wounded in the left arm by a heavy calibre bullet. The ejidatarios held firm against the attack and at 7.30 am they drove back the police.
The next day, 12th January, a police helicopter overflew the community of Xanil, taking pictures of the houses of the coordinators of the resistance. At the same time, groups of paramilitaries from the community of Pamalha, headed by Manuel Jimenez Moreno, and from the community of Xanil led by Juan Alvaro Moreno, Jeremiah Cruz Hernandez and Francisco Jimenez Hernandez moved towards the dispossessed territories to present a possible strengthening of the police assault against the adherents to the Sixth. The same day the “Sixth International Caravan in Support of San Sebastián Bachajón” arrived to offer them support and so to prevent further aggression. The International Caravan includes members from different countries including Colombia, France, the United States and Mexico.
At this time, the compañer@s are strongly maintaining the roadblock, which yesterday became intermittent instead of permanent. They ask us to remain watching for more attacks on the roadblock, and that we all spread the word of their dignified struggle through the different media available.
.
************************************************************
.
News From Bachajón
14th January, 2015
Medios Libres
The ejidatarios adherents to the Sixth from San Sebastian Bachajón have reported that they have modified the roadblock. It is now no longer permanent, but intermittent to allow periods of time when vehicles can pass through. They hold the three levels of government responsible for any attack on their lives or personal integrity as a result of their actions in defence of the mother earth.
On Monday the State Commission for Human Rights issued precautionary measures to protect the safety and to investigate the alleged disappearance of eight Tzeltal indigenous during the eviction operation against the community of Bachajón.
Also on Monday, around 160 members of the state police arrived at the community of Xanil, which is about 5 kilometres from the Agua Azul intersection. This community has a large number of government sympathisers. Similarly in Pamala, which is about the same distance away but in the direction of Palenque, they are organizing groups of people to reinforce the security forces in case of a possible eviction.
On the road to Ocosingo a group of people are simulating a roadblock intended to pressure the government to respond to their demand to evict the ejidatarios of Bachajon, which is believed to have been organised by the government itself.
The area remains tense, with the continuing presence of police and helicopters. The indigenous are expecting an attempt to evict them at any time. They are supported by a brigade of internationals who are accompanying the community against any violation of their rights, and who arrived recently in a caravan (convoy.)
The people of Bachajon demand that the state and its security forces leave their lands immediately and that the ejidal commissioner promises not to hand their lands over to the government. They also demand that the income from the Agua Azul area be administered transparently for the benefit of the ejido itself and not for some government agency.
.
*****************************************************************
.
Movements from the United States and France have visited the recuperated lands of the indigenous from Bachajón opposite the Agua Azul Waterfalls
By: Aldabi Olvera, January 9, 2015
“We thank you for coming distances from other countries to visit and support us, in comparison to our state and the Mexican Republic which has been trampling on us,” the indigenous spokesman told the group which has just arrived in the recuperated office.
About 200 children, men and women applauded and showed a banner: “Welcome to the compañer@s of the international brigades in solidarity and in defence of the Mother Earth and territory.”
“It is so good that you have a good heart and are interested in the struggles of the indigenous peoples for land and territory,” said the host again.
One by one the groups that had arrived in Bachajón, Chiapas, were presented:
Members of the struggle against the airport at Notre Dame Des-Landes, France; campesinos from the collective “we will not be silent” which opposes inserting chips in animals and the industrialization of agriculture; the Committee of solidarity with the peoples of Chiapas.
In addition, the Committee of the true word from Alisal, San Francisco, California, the collective “No One Leaves/ Nadie se Mude”, from Springfield, Massachusetts, which opposes the evictions of migrants; the “First of May” Alliance which founded Radio Zapata in 1994, and Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York.
Having been participants in the World Festival of Resistances and Rebellions Against Capitalism, on Monday 5th January the movements and groups attended a rally organized by the Tzeltal indigenous adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation, who on 21st December last year reclaimed the entrance to the waterfalls of Agua Azul, which is located within its ejidal territory.
The organization Las Abejas of Acteal sent a letter in support of the Tseltales of Bachajón. Similarly, a worldwide statement of support from 14 different countries was read at the event.
A communiqué from San Sebastián was also read to the Sixth where it was explained that on 11th February, 2011 the former ejidal Commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez signed agreements with the government and Conam for the building of infrastructure within the territory of the ejido. They denounced repression, harassment, killings and arrests.
“We are open to dialogue with the ejidatarios of San Sebastián to reach a single solution to the matter of the ejido as we are the rightful legitimate owners of the land and in defence of Mother Earth,” said the spokesman for Bachajón, whose face was covered with a balaclava.
A call was made to the alternative media, human rights centres and civil society to remain aware of the situation.
Finally, a collective statement from groups in England joined together in the UK Zapatista Solidarity Network was read.
A large number of ejidatarios attended the event who are not part of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, but who occupy the recovered territory, and are also committed to maintaining the territorial integrity of Bachajón.
A teacher from the community of Alan Sakun said:
“I have my full rights to participate in a movement where there is no dispute, there is no war, a good path is followed, what we want is to live in peace, in harmony. Let us reach a good agreement with the ejidatarios on equitable distribution, let us not cause problems with the others because they are provoking these.”
“I am going to take to the United States what is a new imagination to the people there who are fighting the bad government, yesterday walking with you I learned that autonomy is a human being and we walk together,” said the representative of Nadie se Mude in farewell.
From New York to Bachajón
The communiqués brought from abroad were read by Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York, which has been linked with Bachajón since 2011, during the dispossession and repression suffered by the people for holding on to a toll booth which is in their territory. At that time, the town had 117 prisoners, of whom 10 were sentenced; they were released as a result of national and international pressure.
The movement of migrants [among other things] carried out various actions outside the Mexican Embassy, coordinated the Worldwide Day for the Bachajón Five, and through various video messages collaborated with Juan Vázquez Guzmán the Bachajón spokesperson until his assassination in 2013.
“I have returned here and it fills me with sadness that Juan was murdered; we say in New York that Juan Vázquez Guzmán still lives in our hearts. The struggle of the adherents of Bachajón has been a great inspiration for us in El Barrio in New York,” said their spokesperson, “the bad government wants to move us from our homes, we are in struggle against displacement”.
“We know we had to migrate to the United States due to the political and economic system of the bad government in Mexico, but although we are far away in New York we think it is important to support the struggle of Bachajón,” said the spokesperson for Movement for Justice in el Barrio from New York.
Since then, the movement primarily composed of women, has visited the Tzeltal community three times.
Recuperation in the face of dispossession
Since they decided to recover their territory, the indigenous of Bachajón have lived intense days. Reinforcements arrived to maintain their position from all the population centres of the ejido.
Supporters of the current ejidal commissioner blocked the road from Palenque to San Cristobal de las Casas charging a hundred dollars and in return giving out a flier accusing the adherents to the Sixth (they called them the Other Campaign, which has not existed since 2013) of murder and labelling them as criminals.
However, the adherents are those who have suffered imprisonment and murder. The groups that came from abroad even visited the tomb of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and met with his brother.
The affected lands have an area of 1100 hectares. Within them are five communities which could be relocated, if the land begins to be used for tourist megaprojects at the Agua Azul waterfalls.
“If the amparo has a favourable outcome, it is not only for us, it is for all the ejido” says the spokesperson.
Now solidarity is needed, whether for the roadblock, they even need muralists, or to visit the three prisoners the organization has in the prison at Yajalón. There is a state police truck at the entrance to Xanil and another at the Waterfalls. The page where calls may come from is https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com
Please note, this article was written before the dispossession of January 9th
.
**********************************************
.
Worldwide Pronouncement In Support Of The Ejidatarios Of San Sebastián Bachajón, Adherents To The Sixth, 11th January, 2015
To our sisters and brothers from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón:
To our Zapatista sisters and brothers:
To our compañer@s from the Sixth national and international:
To the Committees of the True Word:
To civil society in Mexico and worldwide:
Sisters and Brothers:
Compañeras and Compañeros:
To the compañeras and compañeros of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration, we let you know you are not alone in your dignified struggle to defend your ejidal territory which you inherited from your ancestors, and the common lands which have been stolen from you, for the third time, by the bad government.
From different corners of the world, including Springfield, Massachusetts, USA; New York, USA; Alisal, California, USA; Calcutta, India; Dorset, England, and Edinburgh, Scotland, we were outraged to learn that on 9th January, at approximately 6.30 am, the three levels of bad government, with a brutal and excessive force of more than 900 members of the federal and state police, evicted our compañeras and compañeros from the community of Bachajón who had been guarding the reclaimed lands since 21st December. Hours later, the bad government continued to demonstrate their stupidity and criminal attitude.
An example of this stupidity was exhibited by the Government Secretary Eduardo Aguilar Ramirez, who mockingly and mistakenly said that they had now recovered the toll booth (the access route to the Agua Azul waterfalls).
Compañeras and compañeros, your resistance is admirable and evidence of your walking along the three paths of the Zapatistas: those of Not Surrendering, Not Selling Out and Not Giving Up. Despite the dangers of death, imprisonment, and forced disappearance, you decided to try to recover your lands near the Agua Azul Waterfalls today, 11th January, in the morning. As expected, the bad government responded in the only way it knows how to act: with violence. Two of our compañeros were injured. Even so, after an hour of resistance, you drove back the forces of the bad government. There is a threat of further attacks by the bad government and its henchmen (the government-supporting ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón, Alejandro Moreno Gómez, and the vigilance councillor, Samuel Díaz Guzmán). Given all this, we want you to remember that you are not alone.
Compañeras and compañeros of San Sebastián Bachajón, you speak with truth and reason is on your side. On 9th January, 2015, representatives of the bad government, without shame, corrupt and traitors to the motherland committed a great robbery against you. The true interest of these tyrants is to dispossess you from your lands and to give them over to the elite to develop their tourist megaprojects. For us, it has been and will be a great honour to walk with you the path of your dignified struggle in defence of your territory and the mother earth.
For now, we share the following demands:
- We demand a full and fair investigation into the material and intellectual authors of the assassinations of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, and punishment of those responsible
- Respect for the fundamental human rights of the indigenous Tzeltal peoples of San Sebastián Bachajón, and guarantees for their life, personal security and integrity
- Respect and guarantees for their right to the full use and enjoyment of their territory and to the construction of their autonomy and self-determination as indigenous peoples, according to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, in Convention 169 of the International Labour Organization, in Article 2 of the Political Constitution of the United Mexican States, and in the Accords of San Andrés Sakam’chen de los Pobres.
- A fair, impartial and objective resolution of amparo 274/2011
- Immediate freedom for the prisoners Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano, Roberto Gómez Hernández, Santiago Moreno Pérez, Emilio Jiménez Gómez and Esteban Gómez Jiménez.
- An end to the plunder and dispossession, the theft of commons, the militarisation of the area, and to the threats and violence being experienced, and an end to the criminalisation of those who struggle for the wellbeing of their peoples and in defence of their natural resources and the mother earth
Finally, we call on all the adherents to the Sixth Declaration to carry out actions of solidarity and fellowship to accompany the dignified struggle of the people of San Sebastián Bachajón.
¡Juan Vázquez Guzmán Vive, la Lucha de Bachajón sigue!
¡Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Vive, la Lucha de Bachajón sigue!
Movement for Justice in El Barrio, New York
Springfield No One Leaves/ Nadie se Mude, Massachusetts, US
Committee of the True Word from Alisal, California, US
Committee of the True Word from Calcutta, India
Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, England
Committee of the True Word from South-West England
Edinburgh Chiapas Solidarity Group, Scotland
.
*******************************************************************
.
Latest news from Bachajón
Tzeltal indigenous under paramilitary threat.
January 13, 2015 – Ejidatarios from Bachajón reported that right now paramilitaries from Pamalha community, led by Manuel Jiménez Moreno and from Xanil community, led by Juan Alvaro Moreno, Jeremiah Cruz Hernandez and Francisco Jimenez Hernandez are heading towards the dispossessed lands, where the Chiapas State Police are stationed, to reinforce a possible eviction and aggression against the compañeros.
The police trucks are no longer there and the police were walking towards Tumbalá, to enter via the waterfalls of Agua Azul; what could happen is that these groups, which are close to the ejidal Commissioner, and the police could displace the ejidatarios.
http://komanilel.org/2015/01/12/ultimas-noticias-sobre-bachajon/
.
**************************************************
.
160 Members Of The State Police Are Heading Towards The Roadblock Of The Ejidatarios Of San Sebastián Bachajón
January 12, 2015
Ejidatarios adherents to the sixth from Bachajón denounce that at this moment about 160 members of the state preventive police are heading from Ocosingo to the place where the compañeros are maintaining the roadblock (the Agua Azul crossroads), in three large and two small police trucks.
.
****************************************************************
.
Caravan Of The Sixth International To Go To Bachajón To Deter Repression Against The Indigenous Community Of San Sebastián Bachajón
Sunday, January 11, 2015
Taking into account the ability of the federal, municipal and state forces and criminal groups to coordinate to attack and disappear the Ayotzinapa student teachers, considering the ease with which the Mexican armed forces execute civilians as they did in Tlatlaya, and remembering the Acteal massacre, covertly encouraged by the bad government, we are currently extremely concerned for the physical and psychological safety of the indigenous community of San Sebastián Bachajón.
The community of San Sebastián Bachajón has been struggling for over six years to regain their communal lands, which have been dispossessed by the bad government through corrupt practices and terrorist actions. During these six years, two members of this community have been murdered, and 120 have been imprisoned and released through national and international solidarity, but three of them are still in prison. As recently as 9th January, 2015, the bad government made use of more than 900 armed agents to evict the community again after having rescued their territory on 21st December 2014. Today, January 11, 2015, this community was attacked while demanding the withdrawal from their community of the forces of the bad government. Two members of this community were injured.
The indigenous community of San Sebastián Bachajón fears an attack in the coming days by the forces of the bad government and paramilitary groups.
In response to the invitation from the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón we, men and women of conscience and members of the national and international community, adherents to the Sixth, decided to travel in a caravan to San Sebastián Bachajón. We hope that our presence may deter acts of aggression by the bad government and create a promising environment for dialogue and respect for the ejidal lands of this community.
We ask all the adherents to the national and international Sixth to remain on alert for any attempt at aggression that may occur on the part of those from above towards the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón and the members of the “Caravan of the Sixth International in support of San Sebastián Bachajón.”
Adherents to the Sixth and human rights defenders.
http://kolectivozero.blogspot.mx/2015/01/caravana-sexta-internacional-para.html
.
**********************************************************
.
More Than 50 Organisations And Individuals Denounce Dispossession And Violence In San Sebastián Bachajón
.
To the Good Government Juntas and the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Zapatista support bases
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the attendees at the World Festival of Resistances and Rebellions
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the free and independent media
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Sisters, brothers,
Compañeros, Compañeras,
On the morning of 9th January nearly 1,000 members of the Federal and State police evicted the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón from part of their territory. They had recuperated these lands on 21st December 21, 2014, after the bad government had violently expropriated them on 2nd February, 2011. Also during this police operation 8 ejidatarios were detained, luckily they managed to return safely to their compañeros a few hours later.
The recovery of the territory, where the renowned tourist area of the Agua Azul waterfalls is situated, was undertaken peacefully, seeking dialogue with the people themselves. At no time did the compañeros use force. The bad government never wanted to facilitate dialogue between the parties, their only response was to send more agents of the police to evict the compañeros who were guarding their own lands.
The bad government of Mexico steals lands from the campesinos to use them for the implementation of megaprojects. They call this particular megaproject the “Palenque Integrally Planned Centre” (CIPP). The bad government wants to implement in that area luxury hotels, golf courses, a superhighway, and they want to evict the people of Bachajón, with the loss of everything.
There has never been a consultation about this plan with the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, as laid down in Convention 169 of the ILO and the San Andrés Accords. There has only been repression and dispossession. Since 2011 the government and companies have tried to impose their megaproject, ignoring their own laws and an amparo that was gained by the ejidatarios in favour of their territory.
Who would accept being dispossessed of their land without their consent? Who would give thanks if their land was destroyed and plundered for the benefit of a few millionaires? Not in Chiapas, nor anywhere in the world where dignity still exists, that which cannot be bought, and is not for sale, but is redeemed on behalf of what is called “progress”, another disguise of capitalist accumulation.
The government of Mexico and Chiapas mocks the original peoples, provoking wars and dispossessions, praising actions of repression such as the aforementioned eviction. We saw how the secretary of government was proud to have retaken the tollbooth, but what is he proud of? Of having done another service for the capitalists who live from dispossessing the riches of Mexico.
We denounce the repression from the three levels of bad government, who do not allow the dignified people of Bachajón to live in peace, those who seek autonomous forms of life and alternatives to the capitalist model. We remember and denounce that government harassment led to the murders of two compañeros from the local organization: Juan Vázquez Guzmán, on 24th April, 2013, and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, on 21st March 2014. The bad government also uses prison to persecute the organized ejidatarios, we remember the unjust arrest of Santiago Moreno Pérez, Emilio Jiménez Gómez and Esteban Gómez Jímenez; and of Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández; the last three were tortured by the Municipal Police from Chilón on 16th September, 2014.
Today, 11th January, the situation remains very tense. The ejidatarios remain in struggle with various protest actions, while the bad government shows no mercy in repressing them. We report that police shot at the compañeros with rubber bullets injuring several. Also bullet cases were collected as evidence that the public security forces shot at the ejidatarios who were demonstrating. We strongly denounce this umpteenth assault by the bad government.
We remain aware of the situation; no dispossession will stop the struggle of Bachajón and of all those people in the world who are defending life and nature in the face of death and destruction. There will be no place in the world what is already notorious is not known: the murderous Mexican government represses and usurps.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
Freedom for political prisoners!
If you touch one of us, you touch all of us!
Frente Civico Tonalteco y el Consejo Autonomo Regional de la Zona Costa de Chiapas,
Maderas del Pueblo del Sureste, Ac, Mexico
Red Latinoamericana de Lille, Francia
Proyecto 20zln, italia
ASSI (Acción Social Sindical Internacionalista)
CGT – Estado español
Comitato Chiapas “Maribel” – Bergamo, italia
Gruppe B.A.S.T.A., Münster, Alemania
Solidaridad directa con Chiapas, Suiza.
Red de Solidaridad con los Zapatistas del Reino Unido:
Colectivo Zapatista, Manchester
Colectivo de Aprendizaje y Enseñanza Zapatista del Reino Unido
Grupo Solidaridad con Chiapas, Dorset
Grupo Solidaridad con Chiapas, Edimburgo
Grupo Solidaridad con México, Londres
Grupo Solidaridad con los Zapatistas – Essex
KIPTIK, Bristol
Servicio de Traducción Zapatista del Reino Unido
Lento Pero Avanzo, Canada
Alternative libertaire, Francia
Ass. Solidaria Cafè Rebeldía-Infoespai,
Assocaciacion Espoir Chiapas / Esperanza Chiapas, Francia
Kolectivo BoCa En BoCa, Chiapas, Mexico
Kolectivo Zero, Chiapas, Mexico
Espacio Social y Cultural la Karakola, Mexico
Centro de Documentación sobre Zapatismo -CEDOZ-
Associazione Ya Basta! Milano, Italia
Colectivo Azcapotzalco adherente a la Sexta, La Voz del Anáhuac,
Biblioteca Popular, Mexico
Kolectivo Pozol, Chiapas Mexico
Collectif bon pied bon œil, Francia
Plataforma de Solidaridad con Chiapas y Guatemala de Madrid
Union syndicale Solidaires, Francia
Fédération SUD éducation, Francia
Caracol Solidario, Francia
L’Adhesiva Barcelona
Movement For Justice In El Barrio, Nueva York, Estados Unidos
La Pirata:
*Nodo Solidale (Italia y México)
*Colectivo Zapatista de Lugano (Suiza)
*Nomads (Italia y Berlin)
*Adherentes individuales
Mut Vitz 13, Marseille, Francia,
Les 3 passants, Paris, Francia
Grupo de Trabajo No Estamos Todxs
Grains de Sable (Francia-Mexico)
Colectivo Ik’
Beatriz Amor Vicepresidente APDH La Costa Buenos Aires-Argentina
Carole radureau, Francia
Ignacio Perez Perez
Adriana Garcia Ruiz
Héctor Miguel Sánchez Rodríguez, Mexico
Lidiana Moreno Moreno
Juan Velasco Torre
Ernesto Torre Torre
Dionicio Escobedo Escobedo
Martin Ribera Torres.
Ector Mendoza Xochila.
Ernestina Rivera torres.
Alcachofa yano yanos
Antonio lucreci perez
Rogelio torre Rapid
Manuel Vadidio Doret.
Monica. Sfre. Medoza.
Marcos Vazquez Vaxquez.
Juan Gutierez Gutierrez
Eduardo Gutieres Torrez
Patrocino Hemir Torrrez
Alfredo Sanchez Lupillo
Carmela Mened Mened.
Chofis torrrez torrez.
Alberto Ruiz Ruiz
Margarita Ruiz Ruiz.
Eva. Llanos llanos.
Pascual toledo Toledo
Antonio Alvarez Alvarez
Beatris mojante Ruiz.
Xochil. Ruiz Petex
Tebeca Metello Montello
Ernesto Ponse. Ruiz.
Enrique Leon Ponce.
Jacobo Ronis Ruiz .
Octavio Ruiz Oryrga.
Unberto cholik cholik.
Fernando chikay chikay.
Oscar ruiz cikay .
Eucevio ruiz llanos
.
*************************************************************
.
Police shoot at indigenous Tseltales from San Sebastián Bachajón when they try to recover their lands near the Agua Azul waterfalls.
January 11, 2015
#AlertaBachajón
The adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle blocked the turning to the waterfalls of Agua Azul at 6.30 am in resistance against the dispossession of their lands on 9th January.
The state police placed barricades of trees five hundred meters from the turning to the waterfalls, while shooting at them with rubber bullets and live ammunition from a van and a truck of the local and state police.
The attack lasted about fifteen to twenty minutes. At the moment there are thought to be two who have been injured by rubber bullets. Furthermore bullet casings from firearms were found on the ground.
The indigenous did not retreat before the attack and drove the police back at half past seven.
The demand of the Tseltal adherents to the Sixth is that the police leave the land of Bachajón. The ejidatarios will not allow them dispossess them again from those lands of which they are the legitimate owners.
Reports say that Juan Pérez Moreno, from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón was wounded in his left arm. The area remains tense.
******************************************************************
Communiqué from the Ejido San Sebastían Bachajón 10th January, 2015
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 10th JANUARY, 2015
To the Good Government Juntas
To the General Command of the Clandestine Indigenous Revolutionary Committee of the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras, our grandfathers and grandmothers taught us that the struggle for life, dignity and the land lasts our whole life, that the defence of mother earth is never ending, this is why the eviction yesterday, 9th January, by the bad government does not make our heart sad but fills it with more courage to make the movement stronger in the defence of land and territory.
We want to tell the criminal and self-proclaimed governor of Chiapas Manuel Velasco Coello alias Blondie and his faithful lackey the government secretary Eduardo Ramirez Aguilar as well as the puppet Peña Nieto the supreme paramilitary leader that our lands are not for sale, they will not make their great ecotourism businesses and super highways on our territory, we will not allow them to displace communities and increase poverty just so they can become richer at the expense of our suffering. The bad government is doing crap when it robs the indigenous of their lands and territories for international economic projects, but it does not care if it humiliates the poor, the same government does not respect the laws, it mocks the indigenous when it takes away their lands, these bad governments mock the poor because they think that power will last them a lifetime, but someday they will fall and you will see that the people themselves will do justice.
The bad government does business with politics and when people and communities do not do as it wishes it sends its police, kills, imprisons, tortures, disappears, violates and commits massacres, as in Acteal, Atenco, Ayotzinapa and many cases of violations of the rights of the people because this bad government is not there to serve the people, it takes advantage of the people, robs the people, so that the people now have to wake up and rise up to defend their rights.
Increasingly the brothers and sisters of San Sebastián Bachajón are waking up and opening their eyes, they no longer believe in the lies of the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez and vigilance councillor Samuel Diaz Guzman, who are minions of the bad government. The people have now realized the bad policies of these ejido representatives and how they cheat and betray the communities. We are going to keep fighting and adding more brothers and sisters to our struggle for the defence of the land, the commissioner does not have people walking with him, it is only the ways of the bad government which support him with money, projects, consultants of the misnamed political operators, and mainly with the police and army, this is the only way they can retain power, there is no democracy or respect for the law, the people have no other way to defend themselves.
We are neither beaten nor defeated, on the contrary, since 21st December we have shown the government that the people command and the government obeys, although they do not like it and it gives them bellyache, our people continue in the struggle for the defence of the land, for the release of our unjustly imprisoned compañeros and against any injustice committed against our compañeros and compañeras from the communities in resistance in Mexico and the world.
The bad government may have money, property, luxury goods that we the poor do not have, but what we do have is dignity and love for our history, culture and territory and we are ready to defend it at any cost, for the life and death of our compañeros Juan Vázquez Guzman and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano we will not rest until we see our people free from repression and injustice.
Death to the bad government and life to the dignified people in resistance.
We respectfully request that all the compañeros and compañeras in solidarity with our struggle remain alert, because there are strong rumours that the lackeys of the commissioner and the bad government are pointing out the homes of our compañeros so they can arrest them and apparently they are organizing an eviction of the headquarters of our organization in Nah Choj.
We invite you, in your times and geographies to support us in whatever way you can and we also invite those willing and able to visit us so as to encourage our hearts.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas, the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón send our combative greetings.
Never again a Mexico without us
Attentively
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the 43 missing of Ayotzinapa!
JUSTICE FOR AYOTZINAPA, ACTEAL, ABC, ATENCO!
.
*********************************************************************
.
Latest News From San Sebastian Bachajón
The compañeros of Ejido San Sebastian Bachajón have sent the following information: After being missing for 8 hours, the compañeros Mariano Pérez Álvaro, Miguel Jiménez Silvano, Juan Deara Perez, Antonio Gomez Estrada, Manuel Gómez Estrada, Juan Gomez Estrada, Pacual Gómez Álvaro and Martín Álvaro Deara were located in another community 12 kilometres away. They are fine, and say that they managed to escape from the hands of the police, who tried to seize them.
When over 800 state police attacked them, the men and women in the camp who were guarding the land had to escape to the jungle, mountain, hills and ravines.
A group from the free media found that the police are still guarding the recovered territory. There were two state police trucks, and several white vans which were full of police. The detachment there came from different places like Simojovel, Bochil and Tapachula.
We ask you to continue to monitor the situation.
A cultural action in support of San Sebastian Bachajon will be held in San Cristobal de las Casas on Sunday morning.
There are 2 petitions to sign, and people are asked to sign both if possible:
http://redtdt.org.mx/2015/01/ejido-san-sebastian-bachajon-en-riesgo-de-ser-desalojado-nuevamente/
.
************************************************************
.
Chiapas Government Evicts Ejidatarios Of Bachajón From Their Own Lands
Today, Friday 9 January 2015, about 900 members of the federal and state police came to the territory which the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the EZLN, had recovered on December 21, 2014.
They violently evicted the people who were guarding the land. It is noteworthy that among the people who defended this land were children, women and elderly people.
In a letter which came from this ejido, they say that Eduardo Ramírez Aguilar, general secretary of the state government of Chiapas “jokes that they have now recovered the toll booth as if it were their property or territory, their real interest is to dispossess us from our land, they are the true shameless traitors of the motherland.”
Here is the full letter where the facts are explained:
Compañeros and compañeras
Today at about 6.30 am over 900 members of the federal and state police evicted our compañeros and compañeras who were safeguarding the lands we recovered last December 21st.
The bad government, through the government secretary Eduardo ramirez aguilar, mocks that they have already recovered the toll booth as if it was their property or territory, their real interest is to dispossess our land, they are the true shameless corrupt traitors to the country, but their bad politics will not put an end to our just struggle because we will not let them continue to dispossess us as they please. We will continue our actions in defence of the Mother Earth.
We inform you compañeros and compañeras that our following compañeros are disappeared and we hold the bad government, as well as the Commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gomez and the security councillor Samuel Diaz guzman, responsible for their lives and personal integrity:
- Mariano Pérez Álvaro
- Miguel Jiménez silvano
- Deara Juan Perez.
- Antonio Gómez Estrada
- Manuel Gómez Estrada
- Juan Gomez Estrada
- Alvaro Pascual Gomez
- Álvaro Martín Deara
We will give more information later, for now this is all, compañeros and compañeras, we ask you to remain alert and to disseminate this information
combative greetings
Sign the petition: http://redtdt.org.mx/2015/01/ejido-san-sebastian-bachajon-en-riesgo-de-ser-desalojado-nuevamente/
.
.
*************************************************************
The Bad Government Evicts The Compañeros Of San Sebastián Bachajon From Their Lands
January 9, 2015
Our compas, indigenous Tseltales adherents of the Sixth Declaration of the Selva Lacandona, who have been recuperating their ancestral lands of San Sebastián Bachajón in the heart of the Waterfalls of Agua Azul in Chiapas, Mexico were violently evicted this morning (6:30AM) by 900 elements of federal and state police of the bad government.
The following 8 Tseltales have been disappeared:
.
1. Mariano Pérez Álvaro
2. Miguel Jiménez silvano
3. Juan Deara Perez.
4. Antonio Gómez Estrada
5. Manuel Gómez Estrada
6. Juan Gomez Estrada
7. Pascual Gómez Álvaro
8 Martín Álvaro Estrada
Our compas, adherents of San Sebastián Bachajón, hold the bad government, commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gomez and security councillor Samuel Díaz Guzman responsible for the physical integrity and life of the disappeared.
Sign the petition: http://redtdt.org.mx/2015/01/ejido-san-sebastian-bachajon-en-riesgo-de-ser-desalojado-nuevamente/
.
*****************************************************
.
Communiqué from the Ejido San Sebastían Bachajón 3rd January, 2015
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 3rd JANUARY, 2015
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the World Festival of Resistance
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras, the women, men and children of San Sebastián Bachajón remain dignified standing in struggle on the lands reclaimed on 21st December, 2014, resisting the threats of the bad government to evict us and execute arrest warrants for alleged crimes denounced by the National Commission for Natural Protected Areas which have nothing to do with our land but are the pretext of the bad government for wanting to send us to prison for fighting for the defence of our rights.
The peaceful recuperation of the lands on 21st December means that our territory is not in the hands of the government but in the hands of the people and for the benefit of the people; it is our mother earth which is not up for negotiation nor is it for sale for projects of the bad government or of the powerful businessmen who want to impose their projects of death, like the Cancún of Chiapas known as the Palenque integrally planned centre and the mega highway from San Cristóbal de Las Casas to Palenque, and this is why they seek to displace the marginalized indigenous communities by taking over our lands.
The bad government manipulates and controls at its the whim the representatives of the ejido San Sebastian Bachajón, Alejandro Moreno Gómez, ejidal commissioner, and Samuel Diaz Guzman, the vigilance councillor, so that they organize armed groups to displace us from the reclaimed lands, simulating that they have the majority of the ejidatarios on their side, but actually all they have behind them as their support is the bad corrupt government which hides its cunning and its face of death by not respecting the rights of our people.
Our organization has stated that it wants dialogue because the struggle is peaceful and for the benefit of the people, but this dialogue is with the people themselves, because the dialogue cannot be held with the government because it is the real enemy of the people that wants to take away the land. The bad federal, state and municipal governments seek ways of getting their hands on the lands of San Sebastián Bachajón with the excuse that we are going to have confrontations between ourselves as brothers; but they themselves are the ones that are giving arms to the commissioner and the vigilance councillor, to Manuel Moreno Jiménez from Pamalhá, to Juan Álvaro Moreno from Xanil and to Carmen Aguilar Gómez from Chewal to kill us, that is the true face of the bad government, because it wants our brothers to kill us and then afterwards get the land, saying they want to avoid “clashes,” the bad government is a liar and a murderer.
We hold responsible the three levels of bad government, represented by the paramilitary leaders Enrique Peña Nieto, Manuel Velasco Coello and Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, and the traitorous ejidal representatives Alejandro Moreno Gomez and Samuel Díaz Guzmán, for any aggression against our compañeros and compañeras, children, women and men, who are safeguarding the recuperated lands which legally and legitimately belong to the Tzeltal people of San Sebastián Bachajón and not to the bad government.
We urgently ask all compañeros and compañeras for their solidarity with our struggle. We invite you, according to your times and geographies to support in the way you can and also we invite those who are willing and able to visit the men, women and children in the reclaimed lands to encourage our hearts in all our struggles which every one of us experiences every day and so we can continue walking together.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas, the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón send our combative greetings.
Never again a Mexico without us
Attentively
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the 43 missing of Ayotzinapa!
JUSTICE FOR AYOTZINAPA, ACTEAL, ABC, ATENCO!
.
******************************************************************************
.
Pronouncement In Support Of The Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón From The Forum In Defence Of The Land And Against Displacement
.
January 1st, 2015
To the Good Government Juntas and the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the BAZ
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the World Festival of Resistance and Rebellion
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the free and independent media
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
We, the people who are gathered here today in the Forum in Defence of the Land and against Displacement, come from many parts of Mexico and the world. We would like to offer our profound thanks to the indigenous Tseltal peoples of San Sebastián Bachajón for their kind invitation, given in the face of the threats and aggressions that have become a constant part of their struggle. On this very special and appropriate day, when we celebrate the 21st anniversary of the Zapatista uprising, we extend our hand of fellowship and solidarity to the original peoples of these lands, and to all who struggle for a better world, one with peace, liberty, dignity and justice.
As members of the Indigenous National Congress, and as adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, our compañeras and compañeros from San Sebastián Bachajón are engaged in a crucial struggle not only for their own lands and territory, but for the defence of mother earth, of the waters, the forests, the wildlife, the very future of the planet. Faced with the greed and rapacity of governments and multinational corporations, nothing is sacred, and everywhere there is dispossession for mines, dams, windfarms, roads and airports, and for international tourist developments. It is a war of extermination and dispossession, in which the earth, the water, nature are turned into mere commodities, and the indigenous people are in the way of the plans and ambitions of those from above.
The dignified struggle of the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón is a struggle by those who love and respect the mother earth, who work their lands in common, and who promote the collective values of justice, equality, community, liberation and the search for alternative ways of life. Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano gave their lives for this struggle. The communities face intimidation, harassment, aggression, military occupation, arrest, torture, imprisonment and the loss and destruction of all that gives meaning to their lives, from the three levels of bad government, their paid paramilitary supporters, their police forces, and the big businesses which they serve.
We who attend this forum celebrate the peaceful reclamation of their dispossessed land by the ejidatarios on 21st December last, and their quest for dialogue. We offer the dignified women, children, men and elders of San Sebastián Bachajón our total solidarity, in the spirit of the World Festival of Resistances and Rebellions of “an injury to one is an injury to all.” We will follow closely the developments in the ejido and will remain ready to respond to any future acts of aggression. We hold the three levels of government, and especially Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, Manuel Velasco Coello and Enrique Peña Nieto, responsible for the safety and integrity of the ejidatarios who are defending their lands, and for any violence, attacks, killings or acts of harassment and intimidation that may occur.
We demand:
- Respect for the fundamental human rights of the indigenous Tzeltal peoples of San Sebastián Bachajón, and guarantees for their life, personal security and integrity
- Respect and guarantees for their right to the full use and enjoyment of their territory and to the construction of their autonomy and self-determination as indigenous peoples, according to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, in Convention 169 of the International Labour Organization, in Article 2 of the Political Constitution of the United Mexican States, and in the Accords of San Andrés Sakam’chen de los Pobres.
- That priority is given to dialogue and that all acts of repression are avoided against our compañeros and compañeras who are struggling for and defending their rights.
- A full and fair investigation into the material and intellectual authors of the assassinations of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, and punishment of those responsible
- A fair, impartial and objective resolution of amparo 274/2011
- Immediate freedom for the prisoners Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano, Roberto Gómez Hernández, Santiago Moreno Pérez, Emilio Jiménez Gómez and Esteban Gómez Jiménez.
- An end to the plunder and dispossession, the theft of commons, the militarisation of the area, and to the threats and violence being experienced, and an end to the criminalisation of those who struggle for the wellbeing of their peoples and in defence of their natural resources and the mother earth
We call on all the adherents to the Sixth Declaration to carry out actions of solidarity and fellowship to accompany the dignified struggle of the people of Bachajón, and against any attempt to displace our compañeras and compañeros.
We know that the just and dignified struggle of our sisters and brothers of San Sebastián Bachajón will continue, with solidarity from people of good heart from Mexico and throughout the world. As their struggle will not end, neither will our solidarity.
We extend our greetings and congratulations to our Zapatista compañeras and compañeros, and thank them for all the hope and inspiration they continue to give us.
.
*****************************************************************
.
Message of solidarity with the peoples in resistance of the Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón
Compañeros and compañeras, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle of the EZLN,
We greet and embrace your dignified struggle in the defence of your ancestral common lands and territory, your natural resources, your history and tradition, your collective way of living, and all that belongs to you as the indigenous Tseltal peoples who you are.
We celebrate your peaceful reclamation on 21st December of the lands which were dispossessed from you on 2nd February, 2011, and of the tollbooth on the access road to the ecotourism centre at the Agua Azul waterfalls. These lands were appropriated without permission or authorisation from the ejido, and without observing your right to consultation and to free, prior and informed consent.
We know very well that your recuperation of your lands was peaceful and that you seek to avoid provocation and conflict. You seek the way of dialogue to solve the problems of the community for the benefit of all the people. We also know that you have reclaimed what is yours by right, and the actions you have taken have been decided by your communities in assembly.
We condemn the attempts by the three levels of government to displace you from your lands and territory to promote their megaprojects of death including luxury hotels, golf courses, and the super-highway from San Cristobál de las Casas to Palenque. To do this, they have used threats, violence, intimidation, imprisonment, torture and assassination. They have paid armed groups to attack and murder, and they have used public forces to repress and intimidate.
We honour the memory and the struggle of your leaders Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano who gave their lives for their people, their lands and the mother earth.
We call for the release of your prisoners Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano, Roberto Gómez Hernández, Santiago Moreno Pérez, Emilio Jiménez Gómez and Esteban Gómez Jiménez.
We will remain alert and vigilant as to what is happening in the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón. We will hold the three levels of the bad government, represented by Enrique Peña Nieto, Manuel Velasco Coello and Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, responsible for any aggression against our brothers and sisters, who are safeguarding the recuperated lands which legally and legitimately belong to the Tseltal people of San Sebastián Bachajón. We will not remain silent.
We demand guarantees for your lives and personal integrity and respect for your autonomy and free determination as indigenous peoples. These rights are established in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, in Convention 169 of the International Labour Organization, in Article 2 of the Political Constitution of the United Mexican States, and in the Accords of San Andrés Sakam’chen de los Pobres.
Compañeros and compañeras, we offer you all our solidarity and we accompany your struggle
Land and Freedom!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
1st January, 2015
GERMANY
RUSSIA
BRAZIL
POLAND
ENGLAND
MEXICO
SPAIN
GREECE
NORWAY
BASQUE COUNTRY
UNITED STATES
SCOTLAND
FRANCE
ITALY
BÉLGICA
*************************************************************
.
URGENT!!! Threats and harassment against the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón
URGENT!!!
December 30, 2014
We the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle from San Sebastián Bachajon, are resisting and protecting our territory
The officialist (government-supporting) ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón, Alejandro Moreno Gómez, and his vigilance councillor, Samuel Díaz Guzmán, have threatened to displace us and to raise arrest warrants against us.
In an approach that was between the ejidatarios of the Sixth and delegates from the Chiapas state government to seek a dialogue between the ejidatarios of the Sixth and the ruling party, the government people demanded that we withdraw from the recovered land, so as to tell the ejidal commissioner and his people that dialogue was agreed.
This demand was accompanied by threats that if we did not leave the land we would be displaced and arrest warrants issued against us.
For his part, the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez and the people he has been organizing and paying to create tension, today blocked the roads from San Cristobal-Palenque and San Cristobal-Chilón (Temó).
-However, we, the ejidatarios, women and men, are not afraid because we are not doing anything illegal and we will continue to defend our lands peacefully.
We remain ready to dialogue with the other ejidatarios but not to withdraw from the reclaimed lands.
BACKGROUND
-On 21st December last, we, ejidatarios, men and women from the three centres of San Sebastián Bachajón: Bachajón, Alan Sacjun and Ch’ich, adherents and non-adherents to the Sixth, recovered the lands the bad Mexican government took from us, through CONANP, IPC and SSyPC, without permission and/or authorisation from the ejido, depriving us of our right to consultation and free, prior and informed consent. These lands are of great economic importance to the bad government because they access the ecotourism centre of the Agua Azul waterfalls, a centre that has been enriching them at the expense of our people.
We hold the three levels of government and their accomplices responsible for any physical and/or psychological assault which may take place against our women and men compañeros of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón who are on the reclaimed land.
We demand that they stop the threats and harassment which their own state government agencies are planning against us.
“Tierra y Libertad”
“Juan Vázquez Guzmán LIVES, the Bachajón struggle continues”
San Sebastián Bachajón, adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle of the EZLN
.
**************************************************************
.
URGENT APPEAL FROM THE EJIDO SAN SEBASTIÁN BACHAJÓN TO THE FREE, ALTERNATIVE, AUTONOMOUS MEDIA, OR WHATEVER THEY ARE CALLED
San Sebastián Bachajón, Chilón municipality, Chiapas
Saturday December 27, 2014
To the free, alternative, autonomous media or whatever they are called:
We, the ejidatari@s from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, reclaimed our territory located on the boundary of the access to the Ecotourism Centre “Agua Azul Waterfalls” on Sunday the 21st of this month.
In a communiqué of the 21st, it was explained that this action was born of an agreement between the ejidatari@s of the three annexes that make up the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón: Bachajón, Alan Sacjun and Ch’ich; because the federal and state government, through the CONANP, IPC and SSyPC appropriated that area without permission from the ejido. “We will not allow the Public Security, the National Commission of Natural Protected Areas, nor those from above, to continue robbing our people of our territory, to impose their projects of death on the communities.”
Up until today we have spent 7 days watching for any attack, however it is feared that they have paid armed persons (as on other occasions) to come and evict us.
It is reported that the people who were called on by the government-supporting ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez and vigilance councillor Samuel Díaz Guzmán to displace us have said no. That they do not believe them, they feel they are only used by these two people.
On the 23rd of this month a group paid by the government-supporting commissioner blocked the Ocosingo – Palenque road above the community of Xanil as a means of pressure, since they sought the intervention of the bad government to go and evict the compañer@s of San Sebastián. The ejidatarios defending their lands have a well-founded fear that this may be part of the strategy of the federal and state governments to create conditions that would justify sending the security forces to dispossess the ejido of its territory again, under the pretext of avoiding a confrontation.
This is why we call on the compañer@s of the free media to see if they can do the work of accompanying the tollbooth giving access to the “Agua Azul Waterfalls” ecotourism centre as soon as possible from the 28th of this month to January 3, 2015, to cover any attempted attack and eviction.
Also as an organization we will cover the transport and food costs of any compañer@s who can accompany us.
.
**********************************************************
Invitation to the “Forum for the Defense of the Land and against Displacement” with San Sebastián Bachajón and Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York, Adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle
To the national and international Sixth
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the peoples and communities in resistance
To the media
Compañeros and compañeras, our community struggle remains organized for the defense of our lands and against neoliberal displacement; the bad government wants to dispossess us of our lands purely to serve the capitalist interests of the rich and discriminates as always against the people from below who care for our mother earth.
Our struggles continue walking, organized by political and legal means to defend our human rights and reclaim our culture and traditions, to raise our voice and listen to each other and walk and organize ourselves with other struggles that are resisting and defending their territory.
We cannot agree with being dispossessed of our territories only to serve the capitalist interests of the rich who discriminate as always against the people from below who care for our mother earth.
Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York and the people of San Sebastián Bachajón, Adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, have organized to share our resistances in a “Forum for the Defense of the Land and against Displacement” that will take place on Thursday, January 1, 2015 on the anniversary of the uprising of the EZLN, at 5pm at the cultural center “El Paliacate” located at calle 5 de mayo #20, San Cristóbal de las Casas in the other Chiapas.
“Land and Freedom!”
“Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!”
“Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!”
Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York and San Sebastián Bachajón
.
***********************************************************
Write A Letter In Support Of Of The Indigenous People Of San Sebastián Bachajón Who Are At Risk Of Attack At Any Time
The compañer@s from Bachajón reclaimed the toll booth on 21st December. They are being threatened and at any moment the police, the army or a paramilitary force could come to evict them violently. We ask you kindly to send an email to each of the addresses below to show solidarity and demand that the integrity of the compas is ensured.
Suggested wording in Spanish:
іAlto al hostigamiento contra el pueblo indígena de San Sebastián Bachajón!
Desde ………….. (Country or town)
Exigimos se garantice la vida e integridad personal de las mujeres, hombres y niños que resguardan las tierras recuperadas el 21 de diciembre de 2014. Asi como privilegiar el diálogo y evitar todo acto de represión en contra de nuestros compañeros y compañeras que estan luchando y defendiendo los derechos que les corresponden. Exigimos el respeto a la autonomía y libre determinación del pueblo indígena de San Sebastián Bachajón de acuerdo al artículo 2 de la Constitución Política de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos, el Convenio 169 de la Organización Internacional del Trabajo y los Acuerdos de San Andrés Sakam Chem de los Pobres.
Seguiremos pendientes de los acontecimientos en las proximas horas y dias.
………………….
(signature of group or individual)
Email addresses
secretario@segob.gob.mx
ofproc@pgr.gob.mx
secparticular@chiapas.gob.mx
secretario@secgobierno.chiapas.gob.mx
raciel.lopez@pgje.chiapas.gob.mx
uejasoacnudhmexico@ohchr.org
oacnudh@ohchr.org
cidhoea@oas.org
Go to this page for forms you can fill in and send:
http://espoirchiapas.blogspot.mx/2014/12/formularios-de-envio-para-bachajon.html
***
English version of letter:
From………………….
Stop the intimidation of the indigenous people of San Sebastián Bachajón!
We demand guarantees of the life and physical integrity of the women, men and children who are protecting the land reclaimed on 21 December 2014. We also demand the promotion of dialogue and avoidance of all acts of repression against our compañeros who are fighting and defending the rights due to them. We demand respect for the autonomy and self-determination of the indigenous people of San Sebastián Bachajón according to Article 2 of the Constitution of the Mexican United States, Convention 169 of the International Labour Organization and the San Andres Accords of Sakam Chem de los Pobres.
We will continue to monitor developments in the coming hours and days.
Signature ……………………..
http://espoirchiapas.blogspot.mx/2014/12/formularios-de-envio-para-bachajon.html
*********************************************************************
The Make-Up Of Dispossession In San Sebastián Bachajón
On December 21, 2014, dawn came to San Sebastián Bachajón with the news of their having reclaimed their territory located on the boundaries between the areas of Agua Azul and Tumbalá. These lands had been taken from them by the bad government of Juan Sabines Guerrero and Noe Castañón León, in collusion with the then ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón, Francisco Jiménez Guzmán.
Why dispossession? The track giving access to the “Agua Azul Waterfalls” ecotourism centre crosses the lands of San Sebastián Bachajón. Since September 2009, the ejidatarios had administered the access continuously. Until February 2, 2011 when military and police forces came to violently evict them from their land, leaving a total of 117 detainees. The eviction order came through the then governor of Chiapas, Juan Sabines Guerrero (now a fugitive for stealing money and increasing the state’s debt to nearly 40 billion pesos, he fled to Punta Diamante, Acapulco, Guerrero,) and the then Secretary General of Government Noé Castañón León.
After the eviction, the National Commission of Natural Protected Areas (CONANP) installed a tollbooth on the boundary line between Bachajón and Tumbalá, leaving the entire construction in Bachajón, 10 centimetres from Tumbalá. Meanwhile, the Institute of Civil Protection (INP) and the Ministry of Security and Civil Protection (SSyPC) installed a permanent [troop] detachment. A Civil Protection building was built using construction materials the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón kept there. Where the House of Multiple Uses of the ejidatarios used to be is now the parking area for this building.
There was also built, or rather converted, a “Medical Consulting Room,” from a construction that had been begun by the ejidatarios, next to a house with meeting rooms and bathrooms. The meeting house was destroyed; the bathrooms remain, while the supposed medical consulting rooms are not in use, as they have no staff or medical equipment. There is only the facade.
It was not only displacement and dispossession. They also stole their construction materials and destroyed their property.
Plunder masked with legality is what is found on the way to the Agua Azul waterfalls.
The true face appeared again in the early hours of December 21, covered with bandanas and balaclavas, with painted blankets which make clear who they are. This true face speaks in Tseltal and greets the people passing on this road to get to the waterfalls of Agua Azul. They charge 29 pesos less than the CONANP tollbooth for the use of this route, that is to say 10 pesos. Children do not pay.
How much do they earn, the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez and the vigilance councillor Samuel Díaz Guzmán, who have asked the governor of Chiapas, Manuel Velasco Coello, to intervene through the public forces to evict those who have regained their territory?
But the ejidatarios are clear. The dialogue has to happen, and it will only be between the true and rightful owners of the land. Not for negotiation, the land is not negotiable. But so that everyone can live in equality. So there will not be some who are above and some who are below, like there is now.
That’s why they are there, defending what is theirs, the girls, boys, women, men, grandfathers and grandmothers, the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN). But there are also ejidatarios who are non-adherents but feel strengthened by their compañeros ejidatarios to be able to raise their voices and say “ENOUGH, we never agreed with Pancho (former ejidal commissioner), nor now with Alejandro. This is our land and we will defend it.”
However the bad people always are always on the lookout in the face of those who want to build. A day after they recovered their land, there is information that the ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón, Alejandro Moreno Gómez, and the vigilance councillor, Samuel Díaz Guzmán, have been requesting the entry of police forces, and at this moment armed groups are being organized headed by Juan Alvaro Moreno from the village of Xanil, Manuel Jiménez Moreno from the village of Pamalá and Carmen Aguilar Gómez from the village of Chewal Nazaret; to come in a violent way to displace and evict the families who are caring for the land they have regained peacefully, without harming anyone or anything. There is a serious risk that children, the elderly and young people who are on the reclaimed land will suffer attacks on their lives and personal integrity.
The Inter-American Commission of Human Rights (IACHR) have already been informed of this risk, they already know the case for dispossession made against the ejido. Maximum dissemination of information is requested to avoid unfortunate events occurring against the people who are there. It also needs to be clarified that there has been no intention of confrontation or provocation at any time by the ejidatarios who have reclaimed their territory.
They just ask for dialogue. If there has to be violence in the displacement, it will be aggression and attacks from those who do the dispossessing.
http://komanilel.org/2014/12/22/el-maquillaje-del-despojo-en-san-sebastian-bachajon/
***********************************************************
Urgent Action In The Face Of The Possible Eviction Of Ejidatari@s Of San Sebastián Bachajón
IN EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 22nd DECEMBER, 2014
URGENT ACTION
SUMMARY
On February 2, 2011, the Mexican government took possession, through the use of public force, of an area of common land of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, which is crossed by a road leading to the Ecotourism Centre “Agua Azul Waterfalls” located in the neighbouring settlement of Agua Azul, municipality of Tumbalá, Chiapas, Mexico; a tourist destination with worldwide recognition, which is part of a megaproject which the Mexican government intends to implement, called the “Palenque Integrally Planned Centre” (CIPP). In this area of the ejido the ejidatarios, adherents to the Sixth Declaration, had installed a tollbooth, an office for meetings, and public toilets. The Mexican government carried out a violent eviction, and, without consultation and free, prior and informed consent, took over the ownership and administration of the dispossessed land, which was controlled by various police forces until the early hours of December 21, 2014 when it was regained by the ejidal organization.
The ejido Commissioner at the time, Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, worked with the government to hand over the land, and now his successor Alejandro Moreno Gómez and the Vigilance Councillor Samuel Díaz Guzmán maintain the same collaborationist posture with the Mexican government without taking into account the will of their people, and they intend hand over our lands once again to the federal and state governments.
FACTS
On December 21, 2014, at about 6 am, over 300 men, women and children from the three regions that make up the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, recovered peacefully the lands located in the area of endowment of the ejido, in the official municipality of Chilon, Chiapas, which borders the municipality of Tumbalá and the village of Agua Azul. These lands are crossed by the access road to the Ecotourism Centre of the “Agua Azul Waterfalls,” which is recognized as a tourist destination worldwide.
The recuperation of the dispossessed land is the result of an agreement between the ejidatarios of the three annexes that make up the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón: Bachajón, Alan Sacjun and Ch’ich; arising from the fact that the Mexican government, about three years ago, through the CONANP, IPC and SSyPC, appropriated that area without permission and/or authorisation from the ejido, and without observing the right to consultation and free, prior and informed consent.
According to the information we received, we have a well-grounded fear that in the coming hours the ejido authorities will act violently to evict the women, men and children who are protecting the reclaimed lands. Furthermore, Mexican government officials have indicated to the ejidatarios that, within the same period of time, public forces will be sent to displace them. Disregarding the fact that the organization has said it is willing to dialogue and seek a solution by peaceful means, the government and the ejido representatives are choosing the path of repression.
BACKGROUND
On February 3, 2011, 117 compañeros from San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth, were arbitrarily deprived of their liberty as a means to dissolve our organization in resistance and as a means of pressure to accept the handing over of land to government control; nevertheless, five months later they were released in full, thanks to national and international solidarity. In August and September 2011 respectively, Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Vazquez Deara, for being active members of the organization and adherents to the Sixth, were arrested and tortured to incriminate themselves of criminal acts. Both compañeros gained their freedom through the struggle of the organization.
In March 2011 our organization filed an amparo, 274/2011, with the Seventh District Judge in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas, against the dispossession.
On 24th April, 2013, our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán, adherent to the Sixth, spokesman for the organization, community leader and human rights defender was murdered with gunshots. For his activism in the defence of the lands of his people he was illegally detained on 24th December, 2011 and on March 22, 2012 he was threatened with death by the then officialist ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón, Francisco Jiménez Guzmán.
In the morning of 21st March, 2014, the compañero Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, coordinator of our organization for the defence of the land, was killed with over twenty high calibre gun shots.
On 16th September, 2014, compañeros Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández were illegally detained and tortured; they are still being held in prison in Yajalón for crimes they did not commit; the municipal police of Chilón, Chiapas are part of the arrest and accusation; they themselves fabricated evidence against our compañeros.
APPEALS
- That the life and personal integrity of the women, men and children who protect the lands recovered on 21st December 21, 2014, is guaranteed.
- That priority is given to dialogue and that all acts of repression are avoided against our compañeros and compañeras who are struggling for and defending our rights.
- That our autonomy and self-determination as indigenous peoples is respected according to Article 2 of the Political Constitution of the United Mexican States, Convention 169 of the International Labour Organization, and the Accords of San Andrés Sakam Chem de los Pobres.
Write to:
Enrique Peña Nieto
Presidente de México
Residencia Oficial de “Los Pinos”
Col. Chapultepec, México D.F., C.P.
11850, México
Fax: +52 55 5093 4901
Correo-e vía sitio web:
http://en.presidencia.gob.mx/contacto/
Twitter: @EPN
Miguel Ángel Osorio Chong
Secretario de Gobernación
- Abraham González No.48, Col. Juárez,
Del. Cuauhtémoc C. P. 06600, México, D. F.
Tel. (55) 5728-7400 ó 7300.
Jesús Murillo Karam
Procurador General de la República
Paseo de la Reforma 211-213, Piso 16
Col. Cuauhtémoc, Del. Cuauhtémoc, C.P.
06500 México D. F.
Tel: (52.55) 53460000 ext. 0108
Fax: (52.55) 5346.0928
Twitter: @PGR_mx
Lic. Manuel Velasco Coello
Gobernador Constitucional del Estado de Chiapas
Palacio de Gobierno del Estado de Chiapas, 1er Piso
Av. Central y Primera Oriente, Colonia Centro, C.P. 29009
Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, México
Fax: +52 961 61 88088 – + 52 961 6188056; Extensión 21120. 21122;
Correo: secparticular@chiapas.gob.mx
Twitter: @VelascoM_
Lic. Oscar Eduardo Ramírez Aguilar
Secretario General de Gobierno del Estado de Chiapas
Palacio de Gobierno del Estado de Chiapas, 2do Piso
Av. Central y Primera Oriente, Colonia Centro, C.P. 29009
Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, México
Conmutador: + 52 (961) 61 2-90-47, 61 8-74-60; Extensión: 20003;
Correo: secretario@secgobierno.chiapas.gob.mx
Twitter: @ramirezlalo_
Lic. Raciel López Salazar
Procuraduría General de Justicia de Chiapas
Libramiento Norte Y Rosa Del Oriente, No. 2010, Col. El Bosque
C.P. 29049 Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas
Conmutador: 01 (961) 6-17-23-00.
Teléfono: + 52 (961) 61 6-53-74, 61 6-53-76, 61 6-57-24.
Correo: raciel.lopez@pgje.chiapas.gob.mx
Javier Hernández Valencia
Oficina del Alto Comisionado para las Naciones Unidas
Alejandro Dumas No 165,
Col. Polanco. Del. Miguel Hidalgo. C.P 11560, México D.F.
Tel: (52-55) 5061-6350; Fax: (52-55) 5061-6358
quejasoacnudhmexico@ohchr.org ; oacnudh@ohchr.org
Twitter: @ONUDHmexico
Emilio Alvarez Icaza
Secretario Ejecutivo de la Comisión Interamericana de Derechos Humanos
1889 F Street, N.W. Washington, D.C., 20006 U.S.A.
Tel: 202-458-6002
Fax: 202-458-3992
Twitter:@CIDH
Referencia: MC-162-13 y P-844-13
************************************************************
***********************************************************
Ejidatarios From Bachajón Recover Their Territory Which Borders The Access To The “Agua Azul Waterfalls” Ecotourism Centre
San Sebastián Bachajón, Chilón municipality, Chiapas.
Sunday December 21, 2014
Since 6 am today, ejidatarios [communal landholders] of the three regions that make up the ejido Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, along with ejidatarios who are not adherents, peacefully regained their territory located in the area endowed to the ejido, in the official municipality of Chilón which borders the municipality of Tumbalá and the village of Agua Azul. The access road to the “Agua Azul Waterfalls” Ecotourism Centre crosses these lands.
The ejidatarios remind us that on 2nd February, 2011, the government of Juan Sabines Guerrero and Noe Castañón León, in collusion with the then ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzman Jimenez, alias “the goyito,” sent police and military forces to violently displace those who were in the common lands, where there was a hall used for many purposes of the ejido, and a tollbooth, which had been in the hands of ejidatarios continuously since September 2009. After the eviction, which left 117 people in custody, the National Commission of Natural Protected Areas (CONANP) installed its own booth and the Institute of Civil Protection (IPC) and the Ministry of Security and Civil Protection (SSyPC) installed a permanent detachment.
In a communiqué they explained that this action arose from an agreement between ejidatarios of the three annexes that make up the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón: Bachajón, Alan Sacjun and Ch’ich; because the federal and state government, through CONANP, IPC and SSyPC appropriated that area without permission from the ejido. “We will not allow the Public Security, the National Commission of Natural Protected Areas, nor those from above, to continue robbing our people of our territory, to impose the projects of death on the communities”.
Juan Alvaro, an ejidatario who is not an adherent to the Sixth, said that they are upset that the former ejidal commissioner and the current commissioner, Alejandro Moreno, do not take the people into account and furthermore they deceive them. “It’s good that our organized compañeros have not abandoned us and we join this struggle to defend our lands. We do not agree with the Ecotourism Centre or with the superhighway which they want to build. They only steal the land that is ours.”
The recovery of the lands is final. They will not negotiate with the government or any of its agents. “Those we want to dialogue with are the other ejidatarios to see if we can agree on how we can all benefit.” When asked what they would do if someone from the government or a messenger arrived with a proposal or offer, they said they would simply hand over the document they have already prepared which makes their position clear.
“The compañeros Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano gave their lives fighting for this land of their birth and their struggle is remembered by the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón … At the same time we make clear that we are not defending the mother earth and territory just for the organization but for all the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón.”
In their communiqué, the compañer@s also demand justice for Ayotzinapa, Acteal, the ABC Nursery and San Salvador Atenco.
With information from Free Media adherents to the Sixth.
*************************************************************
INDIGENOUS FROM BACHAJÓN RECLAIM THE LAND AT THE ENTRANCE TO THE AGUA AZUL WATERFALLS ON THE EVE OF THE #FESTIVALRYR
By: Aldabi Olvera
San Francisco Xochicuautla, December 21, 2014 – The Tzeltal people of San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, decided in assembly to recover the lands where they had a toll booth, on the way to the waterfalls of Agua Azul. At seven o’clock this December 21, the date of the opening of the #FestivalRyR in Xochicuautla, State of Mexico, the indigenous began to gather at the place.
The people of Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, released a communiqué when they reclaimed their territory. The communiqué reads:
“We hold the three levels of bad government, represented by the paramilitary leaders Enrique Peña Nieto, Manuel Velasco Coello and Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, responsible for any aggression against our compañeros and compañeras who will be guarding the recuperated lands which legally and legitimately belong to the Tzeltal people of San Sebastián Bachajón and not to the bad government, for this reason we demand that they refrain from approaching with their police or paramilitary forces.”
Since they began to defend their ejido, two members of the Sixth from Bachajón have been killed. Juan Vázquez Guzmán, the 24thof April, 2013, and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, the 21st of March, 2014. Three more are imprisoned in the CERESO at Yajalón, Chiapas: Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández.
In the communiqué, the adherents to the Sixth ask the peoples and communities of Mexico and the world to remain aware of what may happen to them.
The territory taken from the Tzeltal indigenous of Bachajón borders the municipality of Tumbalá. On February 2, 2011, about 800 members of the police took the tollbooth that the people of Bachajón had to obtain resources (five pesos per car) for various community expenses.
The former Commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez gave this part of the territory (a quarter hectare) to the municipality without consulting the people, in a March 2011 agreement.
The adherents to the Sixth decided to present the amparo 274/2011 under the designation of “surrogate representation” exercised by Mariano Moreno Guzman, elder of the community and founder of the ejido.
On September 29 the Third Collegiate Court in Tuxtla Gutierrez, on resolving the Amparo in Review 224/2014 against the dismissal of amparo 274/2011 issued by the Seventh District Judge in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas, unanimously reversed that judgment and ordered the case to be sent to the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation.
Bachajón’s lawyers have provided a copy of this resolution toMásde131 with the file number 564/2014.
“This is configured correctly, due to the legal action which seeks to protect the collective rights of the people faced with the complicity incurred by the ejidal Commissioner, with the acts of dispossession by the authorities of the federal government and the State of Chiapas.”
The Collegiate Court, in addition to recognizing the legal and legitimate legal action brought by Mariano Moreno Guzmán, determined to refer the matter to the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation, for purposes of exercising its power to resolve the basis of the matter raised by the ejidatario Mariano Moreno Guzmán, adherent to the Sixth Declaration.
“He notes that the authorities carried out the dispossession of commonly used land of the ejidal nucleus, in the presence of agents of public safety, by the responsible authorities.”
“Relevant aspects arise, such as the denial and lack of access to justice for indigenous peoples, the respect of their right to consultation, and the granting of free, prior and informed consent.”
It speaks about the guarantee of “the protection of the human rights of those facing harassment and intimidation by state authorities” and “the protection, use, possession and enjoyment” that people have of their territories, rights guaranteed in the international instruments, Convention 169 of the International Labour Organization, the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and the Law for Dialogue, Reconciliation and dignified Peace in Chiapas.
It also says of the text of the Collegiate Court:
“The resolution of this case would open the possibility of issuing guiding criteria regarding the scope of the rights of indigenous peoples and the effects that the implementation of government projects could have on them, which could put their territories at risk.”
The court therefore asked the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation to exercise its power of resolution in the knowledge of the application for review.
The Second Chamber of the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation is analyzing the request made by the Third Collegiate Court of Tuxtla Gutierrez. It started with the review of the record number 564/2014; this was referred for the drafting of a report as to whether or not they review the matter, to the Minister Margarita Luna Ramos.
However, the Supreme Court decided not to take the case on November 19, 2014 and to return it to the Third Collegiate Court in Tuxtla Gutierrez to proceed to resolve the matter.
****************************************************************
Residents Of Bachajón Recover Their Territories
by Fabiola Quiroz Gutiérrez
Mexico City, 21 December 2014 – Residents of San Sebastián Bachajón, municipality of Chilon, Chiapas, reported in a communiqué the recuperation of lands that were taken from them by the state and municipal governments on February 2, 2011. They note that throughout this time they have been receiving harassment and attacks to force them to give up their demands.
In 2007, the inhabitants of Bachajón began a long struggle against impunity and the dispossession of their territory. They say that they have an amparo (order for legal protection) in which violations of indigenous territorial rights are recognized, and that because these are not respected, they decided to take back the tollbooth of Agua Azul.
One of the richest reserves of natural resources is located within the territory of Bachajón, the Agua Azul Waterfalls biosphere, where there is a lot of carbon and abundant water, and it is also one of the Chiapas area’s greatest tourist attractions. This is why the government is trying to take over this area, to benefit private companies by building hotels, the Highway from San Cristobal – Palenque and the expansion of Palenque airport.
The statement holds Enrique Peña Nieto, Manuel Velasco Coello and Leonardo Guirao Aguilar responsible for any retaliation towards those who are guarding the recovered lands. Moreover, they also demand the release of political prisoners who are in Yajalón, El Amate and Playas de Catazajá, and they are seeking justice for the murder in 2013 and 2014 of their compañeros Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano and Juan Vázquez Guzmán.
To this end they call on all social organizations, indigenous peoples and communities to show solidarity and support their struggle, they reject the megaprojects underway in the state of Chiapas, in the State of Mexico, Campeche, Puebla, Morelos and all parts of the world.
http://www.somoselmedio.org/article/pobladores-de-bachaj%C3%B3n-recuperan-territorios
*****************************************************************
*******************************************************************
Today, 21st December, 2014, at about 7 am, 300 ejidatarios from San Sebastián Bachajón recovered the lands that were dispossessed from them in 2011, and the toll booth on the way to the waterfalls of Agua Azul. We will keep you updated as information is received.
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 21st DECEMBER, 2014
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the World Festival of Resistance
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras, our people continue to struggle against the dispossession and repression of the bad government which wants by every means to take our land, our natural resources and our dignity as a people; but as in all this time our people have organized to defend and make our struggle grow, the bad government cannot stop this struggle; that is why they attacked us a lot and killed Juan Vázquez Guzmán on 24th April, 2013 and the compa Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano on 21st March, 2014; this is also why we have three compañeros imprisoned in Yajalón, Chiapas, Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández, who were tortured by the Municipal Police from Chilón and the Indigenous Public Ministry of Ocosingo, the lawyer Rodolfo Gómez Gutiérrez who put a gun to the head of our compañero Mario Aguilar Silvano and also put a bag over his head.
For all these injustices of the bad government that prefers to see us dead or in prison, living in poverty and marginalization because it takes away our land to give to big corporations and corrupt politicians so they can become richer while our communities are dying of hunger, without hospitals or schools, they only come here during electoral campaigns and leave their crumbs to entertain people and take advantage of their need, we completely reject this bad policy that only uses and exploits the people; for this reason as an organisation our communities in assembly decided to recover today the lands from which the bad government dispossessed us on 2nd February, 2011, with the complicity of the ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón at that time, Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, aka goyito, and now by his faithful disciple Alejandro Moreno Gomez and his vigilance councillor Samuel Diaz who serve the interests of the bad government, not of their people.
We hold the three levels of bad government, represented by the paramilitary leaders Enrique Peña Nieto, Manuel Velasco Coello and Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, responsible for any aggression against our compañeros and compañeras who will be safeguarding the recuperated lands which legally and legitimately belong to the Tzeltal people of San Sebastián Bachajón and not to the bad government, for this reason we demand that they refrain from approaching with their police or paramilitary forces.
We demand the release of our prisoners in Yajalón JUAN ANTONIO GOMEZ SILVANO, MARIO AGUILAR SILVANO and ROBERTO GOMEZ HERNANDEZ; our prisoners in Playas de Catazajá SANTIAGO MORENO PEREZ and EMILIO JIMENEZ GOMEZ; and our prisoner in El Amate ESTEBAN GOMEZ JIMENEZ.
We ask all the compañeros and compañeras, organizations, peoples and communities of Mexico and the world to remain alert and in solidarity with our struggle because together we can overcome the dispossession and repression of the bad government.
We express our total rejection of mega projects dispossessing the peoples of Chiapas and the whole country, and so we express our total solidarity with our compañeros and compañeras of the ejido Tila, Los Llanos, Candelaria, San Francisco Xochicuautla, the Yaqui Tribe, compañeros and compañeras from Puebla, Morelos, Tlaxcala, Oaxaca and all the peoples who are resisting the prison, death and repression of the bad government we tell them to keep on fighting because they are not alone.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón send our combative greetings.
Never again a Mexico without us
Attentively
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the 43 missing of Ayotzinapa!
JUSTICE FOR AYOTZINAPA, ACTEAL, ABC, ATENCO!
******************************************************
Letter From Esteban, Prisoner From San Sebastián Bachajón
DECEMBER 2014
To civil society
To the independent media
To human rights defenders
To independent social organizations
To the pueblo creyente (believing people)
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the EZLN
THE PRISONER = ESTEBAN GOMEZ JIMENEZ
I have been imprisoned since 2012, they accuse me of an assault, carrying weapons, and murder, my arrest was in a village called (Pamala) when they found me cutting wood and took me to cereso no. 17 playas de Catazaja where I spent a year and 8 months, then I was moved to cereso no. 14 “EL AMATE” in Cintalapa de Figueroa, Chiapas.
Since I was detained there have been many violations of my human rights. Therefore I demand they grant my immediate freedom because I am innocent of these charges that are put against me, I hold the three levels of bad government responsible for any other injustice against me.
I ask all the compañeros and compañeras to help me fight for my immediate release; I belong to the Ejido San Sebastian Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle.
I send a fraternal greeting to the world festival of resistances and rebellions against capitalism !!!!
Zapata lives and the struggle continues !!!
C ESTEBAN GOMEZ JIMENEZ
http://kolectivozero.blogspot.co.uk/2014/12/carta-de-esteban-preso-de-san-sebastian.html?spref=fb
*******************************************************************
30 Mirrors towards the World Festival of Resistance and Rebellion against Capitalism
Where those above destroy, those below reconstruct!
24. Bachajón, Chiapas
The Tzeltal people are being dispossessed of their land, water and culture through paramilitary repression, for the construction of tourist complexes, as well as roads and hotels, at the waterfalls of Agua Azul.
http://espejo30.org/portfolio/espejo-24/
********************************************************************
Dispossession, the other violence against the peoples
Here are 19 stories, 19 dispossessions, 19 resistances which cross Mexican territory against the megaprojects which are imposed on indigenous territories, invading not only their lands, but also their culture, their sacred centres and their survival as peoples.
Desinformémonos
Bachajón, Chiapas, defending their lands and waters in the courts
Government and business interests have used all possible means to seize these lands, where the famous Agua Azul waterfalls are situated, including the imposition of ejidal authorities. The highest court of justice in Mexico must judge the case.
Ricardo Lagunes and Jessica Davies
Mexico. The ejidatarios from Bachajón who oppose giving up their lands for a tourism project are fighting in court for the right to the representation of their people against the communal authorities who, they accuse, do not defend the interests of the indigenous people. In the course of their resistance, launched in 2011, they have already had two leaders murdered and three indigenous imprisoned in what they describe as an act of revenge by the governmental authorities.
Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández are held in the prison at Yajalón, accused -with no more evidence than the word of the police- of the attempted murder of uniformed officers. They were arrested on 16th September, as they walked towards their community, by the municipal police of Chilón. According to the public denunciation by the ejidatarios of Bachajón, adherents to the Zapatista Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, the Tseltales were tortured by Rodolfo Gómez Gutiérrez, officer from the Public Ministry assigned to the Special Prosecutor for Indigenous Justice based in Ocosingo, to make them sign an incriminating confession.
Inhabitants of Bachajón pointed out that the detention may be in revenge for the imprisonment of Sebastián Méndez Hernández, an officer of the aforementioned police, who is accused of killing Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano (a regional coordinator of the Sixth in Bachajón) on 21 March 2014. The murder suspect was handed over to the authorities by a group of ejidatarios from Bachajón, and a friend and neighbour of his was recognized by detainees as part of the group that attacked them.
The struggle for the land
Founded in 1980 by the original Tzeltal inhabitants, the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón is situated in the municipality of Chilón, in Chiapas, south-east Mexico. It is, at 70,000 hectares, one of the largest ejidos in the country, in an area of great biodiversity and natural beauty. The land is rich in natural resources, verdant jungle, wildlife and water. The spectacular waterfalls of Agua Azul, renowned for the turquoise colour of their water at certain times of year, crash and thunder in the neighbouring municipality of Tumbalá, but to gain access to the “Ecotourism Centre” there it is necessary to cross through the ejido of Bachajón. This became the source of an intense conflict.
As part of the Plan Mesoamerica, the Mexican government, in consultation with transnational corporations and through the National Tourism Foundation (FONATUR), has drawn up plans for the Palenque Integrally Planned Centre (CIPP), a network of infrastructure and services through which the natural and archaeological attractions will be used to promote an elite tourism, resulting in the displacement of the indigenous population.
Agua Azul is the focus of this development, with very expensive luxury hotels accessed by helicopter, which the ejidatarios describe as: “neoliberal tourism projects which are only for the rich, and for which we will only carry the luggage and clean the toilets.” This plan also involves a highway from San Cristóbal de las Casas to Palenque, and the new international airport at Palenque, which was opened on February 12, 2014 by Manuel Velasco Coello, governor of Chiapas, and Enrique Peña Nieto, President of Mexico.
The ejidatarios described their situation in a communiqué on 17 August, 2013: “The struggle of our people from San Sebastian Bachajón is to keep our indigenous territory which we inherited from our ancestors, it is where we live, it gives us life and identity. We are defending our land with our lives if necessary, against the ambition of the government and of the lords of money who want to build luxury hotels, golf courses and runways for rich tourists, at the cost of the exploitation, marginalization and discrimination of our people; faced with the defence we have mounted against these projects the government has had only one answer: repression, imprisonment and death.”
History of Resistance
“The Tzeltales are a historically combative people”, says their lawyer Ricardo Lagunes Gasca in the film ‘Bachajón – Dispossession is death. Life is resistance,’ “they have always defended and sought to keep control of their territory.” On March 19, 2007, many of the ejidatarios of San Sebastian Bachajón declared themselves adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, an initiative promoted by the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN). They marked this action by appointing their own authorities, since the ejidal officials were very close to the government. As they put it in a communique: “Since 2007 the bad government has intervened in the internal life of our community to impose ejidal representatives as they please, who serve them as if they were their minions to defend the interests of the capitalists and not those of the indigenous people.”
Following this decision in 2007, the adherents decided to exert their right as original peoples to free determination over their land and its resources, and constructed a tollbooth in their territory where tourists would pay to visit the Agua Azul waterfalls. It was decided in their assembly what to do with the money taken. Mainly, they say, it was used for the sick, and to support families in need, but this money was not just used for the adherents to the Sixth Declaration, it was available to every member of the community who was experiencing hard times, including the government supporters.
The tollbooth became a focal point for the conflict. There was a violent eviction in 2009. The booth was reclaimed, but on February 2, 2011, in a huge operation, police and shock groups again evicted the ejidatarios and 117 people were arrested. At this time, the authorities not only took over control of the tollbooth, they also illegally seized 2,590 square metres of communally owned lands.
The adherents to the Sixth Declaration began the legal defence of their lands in March 2011, against the violent dispossession of their territory carried out by the then Government Secretary, Noé Castañón León, in coordination with Leonardo Rafael Guirao Aguilar (president of the Green Chiapas Foundation and now the municipal president of Chilón), along with the former ejidal commissioner, Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, and government supporting groups from the communities of Xanil and Pamalha, both in the municipality of Chilón.
Since March 2011 the adherents have faced a series of arbitrary judicial decisions which have denied them justice and a prompt and effective means of protecting their lands; despite these serious violations of their rights, and in spite of the racist and discriminatory prejudice towards indigenous people that pervades the justice system, they have continued to resist and have chosen to challenge the illegal judgements made by the Seventh District Judge in Tuxtla Gutierrez. They have also appealed to public opinion over the lack of ethics of certain federal judges who kneel before economic and political interests.
On 5th February, 2014, the ejidatarios adherent to the Sixth Declaration sued before the Agrarian Tribunal in Comitan for the annulment of the election of the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez and other officialist (government-supporting) ejidal authorities, for not acting in accordance with the Agrarian Law and the customs and traditions of the community. In January and March 2014, the ejidatarios denounced that the officialist authorities tried, through deception, to seek the annulment of their amparo (order for legal protection) 274/2011.
During the processing of the case for amparo, the Third Collegiate Tribunal in Tuxtla Gutierrez on two occasions warned of violations of due process of law committed by the Seventh District Judge, since he failed to make known to the general assembly of ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón the existence of the petition for amparo filed by Mariano Moreno Guzmán, as a substitute representative, in defence of the collective rights of the indigenous Tzeltal people of Bachajón. Now the general assembly has been notified of the case, and the Third Appellate Court, in their session on 29th September, 2014, ordered the case to be sent to the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation to exercise its power of attraction in view of the relevance and significance of the subject in relation to the International Law of Indigenous Peoples.
It is in this context that the political murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán must be set. Active in the defence of the land and territory of Bachajón since 2006, on April 18, 2010, he was appointed Secretary General of the three centres of the ejido. “People sought him out a lot for his skills and abilities to relate to the world of the Caxlanes (mestizos),” said Lagunes Gasca, “to defend and translate the problems of the indigenous communities and to put them on the table of the authorities”.
On March 21st, 2014, Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, a regional coordinator for the Sixth in Bachajón, was ambushed and killed with over twenty gunshots. At the time of his death he was travelling to his community of Virgen de Dolores, which, along with the community of Nah Choj, was founded by the adherents to the Sixth Declaration in 2010.
The ejidatarios accuse: “The bad government wants to finish us off completely by assassinating our compañeros, using their paramilitary gunmen, who with complete impunity, whether by night or in the full light of day, are able to vilely murder our compañeros who are working and struggling to construct a world in which other worlds fit.”
http://desinformemonos.org/2014/11/la-batalla-de-los-pueblos-contra-el-despojo/
http://www.desinformemonos.org/PDF/despojo2.pdf pp 20-24
************************************************************************
*****************************************************************
San Sebastián Bachajón: Third Collegiate Tribunal Sends Their Amparo For The Dispossession Of Their Lands To The Supreme Court Of Justice Of The Nation
November Update
The Second Court of the Mexican Supreme Court is analysing the petition of ‘attraction’ made by the Third Collegial Court of Tuxtla Gutierrez. It began the investigation of the Attraction Power number 564/2014 and gave the task to Minister Margarita Luna Ramos. On October 22nd, the Third Collegial Court published the following agreement within the ‘Amparo under Revision’ 224/2014 in which we can see the Mexican Supreme Court has started proceedings regarding the appeal for an Attraction Power:
224/2014 Mariano Moreno Guzmán, representative of the San Sebastián Bachajón Ejido, Chilón Municipality, Chiapas; Constitutional Governor of the State of Chiapas; and others
21/10/2014 “…May it be added to this report… that the implementation of a “reception with observations” has been authorised….”
Summary prepared by Oso Sabio, from an original in Spanish by Ricardo Lagunes
*********************************************************
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 3rd NOVEMBER, 2014
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeras and compañeros
The women and men of the pueblo of San Sebastian Bachajon greet all the peoples and communities in resistance who defend their territories against the projects of dispossession of the bad government. We greet and send all our solidarity to the families and compañeros of the 43 missing normal school students of Ayotzinapa disappeared by the bad government since September 26, 2014, and demand their immediate presentation alive.
We inform you that on 29 September last, for the third time we succeeded in overturning the decision of the Seventh District Judge of Tuxtla Gutierrez in judgement 274/2011 which did not recognise our right as ejidatarios to defend our territory, despite demonstrating that the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gomez and the former ejidal commissioner Francisco Jimenez Guzman aka Goyito are accomplices of the bad government because they gave away the lands illegally and allow the police to be stationed on our territory without authorization from the highest body of the ejido.
On 29th September the third collegiate tribunal in Tuxtla Gutierrez resolved our appeal number 224/2014 in a review which says that the ruling of the seventh judge is incorrect and that our demand is indeed valid, because our organization along with compañero Mariano Moreno Guzman submitted our petition in compliance with the requirements of the law and also because the officialist ejidal commissioner never did anything to defend the lands of the ejido, when this situation happens every ejidatario can file their claim. Also the third collegiate tribunal, on the grounds that the violations of our rights as indigenous people are very serious, took the decision to send our amparo to Mexico city so that the supreme court of justice of the nation can consider whether or not it can resolve the case, in the next few weeks it will give its response. The case is turned over to the Minister Margarita Luna Ramos to present a draft consideration of the case for 12th November. We will be awaiting the decision of the supreme court as to whether it will consider the case or return it to the third collegiate tribunal, and we will continue fighting to regain our land.
Our compañeros the political prisoners JUAN ANTONIO GOMEZ SILVANO, MARIO AGUILAR SILVANO and ROBERTO GOMEZ HERNANDEZ, who were tortured by the bad government and have been deprived of their freedom unjustly since 16th September, 2014 for fighting for justice and the defence of their territory, were transferred on 2nd October to prison number 12 Yajalón, Chiapas, where they remain unjustly imprisoned for crimes they did not commit which were fabricated by the Chilón municipal police, in revenge for the imprisonment which our community, Virgen de Dolores, achieved for their compañero Sebastián Méndez Hernández, who is a prisoner in El Amate for the murder of the compañero and former co-ordinator Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano. On October 24, the proceedings were admitted for the amparo against the detention order made by the mixed judge of Ocosingo, Lic. Omar Helería Reyes, dated September 24, 2014, for the crime of attempted murder. We demand their immediate release because the crimes are fabricated and the proofs are illegal. The judge from Ocosingo only took into account the statement by the commander of the municipal police from Chilón and two of his officers for making the detention order.
We also demand the release of our compañero SANTIAGO MORENO PEREZ who has been imprisoned since 2009 in the prison of Playas de Catazajá on the accusation of priistas from the community of La Pimienta, because at the time he was arrested he held the position of autonomous vigilance councillor for the other campaign, and they blamed him for a crime he did not commit in order to remove him from office. Our compañero EMILIO JIMENEZ GOMEZ, imprisoned since July 2014 also in Playas de Catazajá, was identified by the community of Xanil as having assaulted a foreigner, but this same foreigner said the compañero was not the person who assaulted him, but the priistas took him as a prisoner to Playas de Catazajá with the complicity of the state preventive police. Our compañero ESTEBAN GOMEZ JIMENEZ, imprisoned since 2013 in Playas de Catazajá and then transferred to El Amate, was accused by the member of the green ecologist party Manuel Jiménez Moreno from the community of Pamalha of an assault he did not commit, which is why he was first arrested, and then once arrested they began to accuse him of other crimes.
We express our total rejection of the megaprojects which are dispossessing the peoples of Chiapas and throughout the country, for which reason we offer our total solidarity to the compañeros and compañeras of the ejido Tila, Los Llanos, Candelaria, San Francisco Xochicuautla, the Yaqui Tribe and all the peoples who are resisting jail, death and repression from the bad government, we tell them to keep fighting because they are not alone.
We demand that the bad government and the officialist ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón, Alejandro Moreno Gómez, do not continue robbing our people of their territory and natural resources, because the people will continue defending them.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón send our combative greetings.
Never again a Mexico without us
Attentively
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
Immediate presentation of the 43 missing of Ayotzinapa!
**************************************************************************
On November 12, the Supreme Court decides whether or not it will consider the case of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón
Bachajón Chiapas, Mexico, November 4th. “Taking the view that the violations of our rights as indigenous people are very serious, the third appellate court in Tuxtla Gutierrez has taken the decision to send our amparo to the city of Mexico, so that the Supreme Court can consider whether or not they can resolve the case,” reports the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, of Chilón, Chiapas.
The case is turned over to the Minister Margarita Luna Ramos, who will present a draft consideration of the case for November 12. “We are waiting for the decision of the supreme court as to whether they will consider the case or return it to the third collegiate tribunal, and we will continue to fight to regain our land,” say the Tseltal indigenous.
The ejidatarios, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, also pronounced for the freedom of their imprisoned compañeros: JUAN ANTONIO GOMEZ SILVANO, MARIO AGUILAR SILVANO and ROBERTO GOMEZ HERNANDEZ, “who were tortured by the bad government and have been unjustly deprived of their liberty since 16th September, 2014, for fighting for justice and the defence of their territory,” they state.
“They were taken on 2nd October to prison number 12 in Yajalón, Chiapas, where they remain unjustly imprisoned for crimes they did not commit and which were fabricated by the municipal police of Chilón, in revenge for the imprisonment which our community, Virgen de Dolores, achieved for their compañero Sebastián Méndez Hernández, who is a prisoner in El Amate for the murder of the compañero and former co-ordinator Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano,” explain the organized campesinos.
“On October 24, the proceedings were admitted for the amparo against the detention order made by the mixed judge of Ocosingo, Lic. Omar Helería Reyes, dated September 24, 2014, for the crime of attempted murder. We demand their immediate release because the crimes are fabricated and the proofs are illegal. The judge from Ocosingo only took into account the statement by the commander of the municipal police from Chilón and two of his officers for making the detention order,” say the complainants.
The ejidatarios are also demanding the release of their compañeros SANTIAGO MORENO PEREZ who has been imprisoned since 2009 in the prison of Playas de Catazajá; EMILIO JIMENEZ GOMEZ imprisoned since July 2014 also in Playas de Catazajá; and of ESTEBAN GOMEZ JIMENEZ, imprisoned since 2013 in Playas de Catazajá and then transferred to the prison of El Amate, in the central part of the state.
“We express our total rejection of the megaprojects which are dispossessing the peoples of Chiapas and throughout the country, for which reason we offer our total solidarity to the compañeros and compañeras of the ejido Tila, Los Llanos, Candelaria, San Francisco Xochicuautla, the Yaqui Tribe and all the peoples who are resisting jail, death and repression from the bad government, we tell them to keep fighting because they are not alone,” says the ejido of San Sebastián.
**************************************************************************
There are dark hands and tourism interests behind the arrest of the ejidatarios from Bachajón
Desinformémonos
It is not the first time that the municipal police of Chilón, under orders from the Mayor, have criminalized and harassed the defenders of territory, says their lawyer a few hours after the ruling on the legal status of the Tseltales.
UPDATE: JUDGE ISSUES FORMAL ORDER OF IMPRISONMENT AGAINST THREE EJIDATARIOS AND RECLASSIFIES THE CRIME OF WOUNDING TO A MORE SERIOUS ONE: ATTEMPTED MURDER.
The lawyer defending the Tzeltales, Ricardo Lagunes Gasca, described the incident as “shameful actions of the judge, completely subjected to the interests of the executive,” since it relied on the “illegal” evidence of the prosecution.
Mexico, DF. Behind the arrest of three ejidatarios from San Sebastián Bachajón –accused of wounding a municipal policeman from Chilón, Chiapas, is not only the hand of the municipal president, Rafael Guirao Aguilar, but also the interests of the state and federal governments in handing over the community land to private tourism companies, the defender Ricardo Lagunes Gasca believes, within a few hours of reaching the constitutional deadline for the trial judge to rule on the possible release of the detainees.
Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández were arrested on September 16, as they walked towards their community, by the municipal police of Chilón. According to the public denunciation by the ejidatarios of Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle of the Zapatistas, the Tseltales were tortured by Rodolfo Gómez Gutiérrez, officer from the Public Ministry assigned to the Special Prosecutor for Indigenous Justice based in Ocosingo, so they would sign an incriminating confession. The defence lawyer for the Tseltales indicates that the police accuser was injured, but that this was during the patriotic celebrations in the county seat.
Inhabitants of Bachajón noted that the detention may be in revenge for the imprisonment of Sebastián Méndez Hernández, an officer of the aforementioned police, who is accused of killing Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano (a regional coordinator of the Sixth in Bachajón) on 21 March 2014. The murdered man came from Virgen de Dolores, a community founded in 2010 by the ejidatarios on recuperated land. The murder suspect was handed over to the authorities by a group of ejidatarios from Bachajón, and a friend and neighbour of his was recognized by detainees as part of the group that attacked them.
The detainees spent nine hours in the hands of police, who had to deliver them to the nearest public ministry, located a maximum of an hour away. On September 19th, the joint mixed trial judge of Ocosingo, Omar Heleria Reyes, requested bail of 300,000 pesos for each detainee to obtain release, which, according to their lawyer, is unconstitutional because it is disproportionate to the economic situation of indigenous prisoners and allowed no possibility of access to the benefit (bail).
Lagunes Gasca points out that it is not the first time that the municipal police from Chilón have acted with such “impunity” with the intention of retaliating against people from Bachajón. He recalled that officers from the same force arrested the murdered Juan Vázquez Guzmán in 2011; he was released the same day for lack of evidence against him. He added that the municipal president of Chilón, a member of the Green Ecologist Party of Mexico (PVEM) is indicated as a supplier of arms to the paramilitary group Los Chinchulines and is very close to the Governor Manuel Velasco Coello.
“Compañero Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano,” said the ejidatarios in a communiqué on March 23, “is part of the foundation and construction of autonomy in the Virgen de Dolores community, his participation and his work for the organization and the community will never be forgotten because we carry it in our hearts… Since we founded the communities of Nah Choj and Virgen de Dolores in 2010, our organization has been harassed at various times by the army and state preventive police, threatening us with eviction.”
The ejidatarios the bad government of wanting to ” finish us off completely by assassinating our compañeros, using their paramilitary gunmen, who with complete impunity, whether by night or in the full light of day, are capable of vilely murdering our compañeros who are working and struggling to construct a world in which other worlds fit.”
Founded in 1980 by the original Tseltal inhabitants, the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón is in the municipality of Chilón, Chiapas, in southeastern Mexico. The ejido, one of the largest in Mexico, has 70 hectares in an area of outstanding natural beauty and biodiversity, where the waterfalls of Agua Azul are situated. The state and federal governments plan to build a large tourist complex, which is why the ejidatarios adherent to the Sixth started their resistance.
On March 19, 2007, many of the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón declared themselves adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, an initiative promoted by the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN). They decided to exercise their right to self-determination over their lands and resources as original peoples, and built a toll booth on their territory, where tourists pay for their visit to the waterfalls of Agua Azul. The booth became a focal point for conflict.
On several occasions, the ejidatarios denounced the eviction of the booth and the attempted imposition of political parties allied to the authorities. In this context, Juan Vázquez Guzmán – spokesperson for the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón -was murdered with six shots at the door of his home on April 24, 2013, in what was widely interpreted as a political assassination. The material and intellectual murderers remain unpunished.
****************************************************************************
Web Of Testimonial Of Four Indigenous Prisoners In Chiapas
October 24, 2014
By: Aldabi Olvera
A heavy blanket of fog and rain densely covers the valleys, canyons and mountains of Chiapas. It seems that the strong threads of heaven are gradually forming a wall to convert the territory into a giant prison of the mind,
white,
cold.
Travelling these roads, with compañeras and compañeros I visited four prisoners in a week:
Alejandro, indigenous Tsotsil, is imprisoned unjustly in CERESO 5 in San Cristobal de las Casas.
Mario, Juan Antonio and Roberto, Tseltal indigenous, are prisoners for political reasons. “Revenge of the police”, say his family. They have just been transferred to CERESO 12 in Yajalón.
A heavy blanket of fog and rain drowns the mountains from the north to the highlands of Chiapas. Despite the heaviness with which the huge threads of nature tie the soul, the walls raised by humans are more terrible. However, a profound word is emerging from the voice or the pen of the prisoners, and there is no density or wall that can stop this voice.
The letters of Alejandro
“I demand the freedom of all political prisoners and those imprisoned unjustly throughout the world…”
Two years ago he could not speak Spanish. Now, as we have documented in Másde131, the indigenous Tsotsil Alejandro Díaz Sántiz is responsible for publishing reports on the situation of the inmates of CERESO 5.
“I’m fine, I feel good,” says Alejandro smiling. At the time of the visit, he has been fasting for 16 days. He shows me his notebook where he has written that he will lift his fast on October 20th. His letters are clear, neat:
“Those who govern in our country and state, peoples, have governed backwards, as they have only caused harm to the rights of human beings, such as disappearances, unfair imprisonments, among others.”
“Do you write this for the students of Ayotzinapa?” I ask.
“The government itself does that,” he replies.
His words are like a complex textile leading into a deep freedom. When I watched him write, he does it slowly, carefully, like a craftsman. I remember when he told me months ago: “If I had not ended up in prison, I would be dead. I did not know how to speak or write, but I learned it through the struggle.”
“Today my lawyers, Sandino Rivero and Leonel Rivero requested remission of sentence from the governor of Veracruz, Javier Duarte Ochoa, and Manuel Velasco Coello, governor of Chiapas.”
Remission of sentence is one of the last tools that Alexander has to obtain his release. His lawyers filed on October 16 that the government of Veracruz accept and order his release on account of his work and conduct in prison. He now has to wait for that information from the state government of Chiapas. The answer could take two weeks after it was filed for legal recourse.
On 11 May, Sántiz Diaz completed a period of 15 years in different prisons, from Veracruz, where he allegedly committed the crime of murdering his own daughter, to now in CERESO 5.
He finished reading his communiqué:
“Together we can win true justice. Alejandro Diaz Santiz, Solidarity with the Voice of el Amate, adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle.”
I keep thinking about what Alejandro said on a previous visit, that he always wanted to struggle, that he wanted to be Zapatista since childhood, that now he can be an adherent to the Sixth in prison. He fulfilled his dream overcoming his fear of speaking, writing, expressing himself.
A compañera brings him a song. I tell Alejandro that now we are going to leave him a letter to set to music. He smiles and says yes, if he can.
“Why do not you weave hats and bracelets, Alex?” I asked a month ago.
“I do not have time, now I have to write a lot,” he replies.
Neatly, slowly, he begins to write a few lines for me to take out of prison. Then, he accompanies us to the exit. We learn that this October 24th he will spend another birthday in prison. All have gone, I stay until the end. I raise my left arm, close my fist, show him what it says in my notebook. Alejandro Diaz Santiz also raises his left arm and makes a fist, a ritual that we have woven without talking since I first met him, a series of words between the eyes and hands to be repeated until I see him get out of prison.
Threads and torture
The road to CERESO 12 Yajalon, where the three Tzeltal prisoners from San Sebastian Bachajón are held, is steep and curving. In Ocosingo, where there was heavy fighting between the EZLN and the army in 1994, the water forms small streams on the pavements. This does not erase our memory, in contrast, it reawakens it.
The journey is expensive. Sixty pesos from San Cristobal; another sixty from Ocosingo. The whole situation has a high cost for the families of the prisoners who we meet after entering the prison.
“This is costing us a lot, compañeros. It is costing us a lot. Sometimes we despair. We have the idea, but we do not know if we can do it,” they say when thinking what the possibilities are to get their three prisoners out of jail.
“Let’s go in, compañeros.”
“Today is only the day for family visits, but as you have come from far away we will let you in,” says the man in charge of the visitor’s book. This is extremely unusual, usually the watchword of the wardens and directors is to hinder visits to political prisoners.
Juan Antonio, Roberto and Mario, sitting in that order, are on a bench in the courtyard of the prison, full of looms for weaving hammocks. The first thing that strikes you is something that a compañera had told me: “They are very young”.
Nineteen, twenty and twenty-three, surrounded by their families, they look down. We do too. It is hard to know what to say, even when it is already agreed that each will make a presentation. That is why I am here.
“Help me to get my freedom. I have a wife and son, I cannot support them in here,” says Roberto. He cannot explain in a way other than with anger and powerlessness. His tears appear, want to fall and then pass.
Roberto is the best speaker of Spanish. He translates what the others say:
Mario is still in pain from the blows he received. He points to his ribs. He was kicked hard in the torso. He has a scar on his right eyebrow. He still feels dizzy. They put a bag on his head and threatened him if he did not incriminate his compañeros. The prosecutor from Chilón, Rodolfo Jiménez Pérez, said: “If you do not say that you were there, I’ll kill you, shoot you with a bullet and throw you in the river.”
Juan Antonio, Roberto and Mario tell how they were at the celebration of September 15, when early in the morning they and other young people from Bachajón were stopped by members of the police from Chilón who pointed out Juan Antonio. They went against the three of them, detained and tortured them.
Mario looks up suddenly, sadly. I notice a huge scar above his lip. We are left again not saying anything. It is as if we were all under sentence. Not shame, but a punishment that can hardly be expressed in words. Meanwhile, the other prisoners carry on weaving, looking at us sideways curiously.
They dragged Juan Antonio along the ground. His face is still scraped. They kicked him hard on the head. Blood came out of his ear. He has a headache.
He is the brother of Juan Carlos Gomez Silvano, who was a coordinator of the adherents of the Sixth until he was assassinated last March by the Chilón police. According to the three young men, their families and various communiqués released by the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, the arrests were made in retaliation for the capture and subsequent imprisonment of the police officer Sebastián Méndez Hernández in the prison of El Amate.
Roberto explains:
“They accused us of aggravated assault. As we did not know, we signed it. Bail was 300 thousand pesos. The public defender told us to sign. The witnesses are both police officers.”
An order of imprisonment for attempted homicide was the verdict of Omar Eleria Reyes, mixed trial judge in Ocosingo, issued on September 24 against Juan Carlos, Mario and Roberto, reclassifying the crime and leaving them no possibility of bail.
“My vision is dark, my sight is cloudy and I have to wait. Afterwards I recover,” says Roberto. The health situation of the three concerns their family members, they may have internal injuries.
Juan Antonio remains silent. He does not want to talk. “He has no means to work to support his family,” says Roberto, “we weave hammocks, but in here the ball of thread costs thirty pesos. There is little profit.”
The cost of weaving each hammock is 500 pesos. If the thread is bought in prison it is not worth doing. We talked about the urgent economic need and how they can get out of prison:
“Yes we knew Patishtan, we knew he got out. After all the years that he had done. So they tell us: Yes you will get out. But we are afraid that they will move us to el Amate (the prison far away where the indigenous Tsotsil Professor Alberto Patishtan was held.)”
“Here it is quiet,” says Roberto.
Juan Antonio, Roberto and Mario continue to rest on their arms. We ask what colour thread they need to start weaving: green, blue, red, yellow.
At one point, the families say:
“They cannot not stay like this. They will be ill.”
On leaving we look at their faces. My hand just touches the arm of Roberto. Again there are unshed tears, we look away. A tangle of wires spills water over the hills of Yajalon. We say goodbye. It has started to rain. Outside the prison is a sign that says, “Movement for the Defence of Territory: No to the Highway from San Cristobal to Palenque”. We are charged with bringing in threads to weave, and bringing out their own fabric of woven words.
A light blanket of fog and rain begins to cover the valleys, canyons and mountains of Chiapas. It seems that the water from the sky gradually forms a wall to make the territory into a giant prison of the mind. However, we carry on single sheets the means to climb over any wall: The woven fabric of the word.
@Aldabi
http://www.masde131.com/2014/10/tejido-testimonial-de-cuatro-indigenas-presos-en-chiapas/
************************************************************************************
The Third Collegiate Court In Tuxtla Gutiérrez Refers San Sebastián Bachajón’s Amparo (Request For Legal Protection) Concerning The Dispossession Of Their Territory To The Supreme Court
The following information concerns the legal information about the call for protection (amparo) of the comrades of San Sebastián Bachajón (judgement 274/2011) from the dispossession of their land made on February 2nd, 2011.
On September 29th 2014, the Third Collegial Court of Tuxtla Gutierrez unanimously revoked (in judgement 224/2014) the cancellation of judgement 274/2011 (a ruling passed down by the Seventh District Judge of Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas), after a complaint lodged by the Sexta adherents of San Sebastián Bachajón. The court subsequently ordered that the case be sent to the Mexican Supreme Court, because of the relevance and transcendence of the issue in terms of the International Right of Indigenous Peoples.
The ruling of the Seventh District Judge, José del Carmen Constantino Avendaño, had been revoked because it had been considered to have interpreted the Law of Protection incorrectly with regards to ‘substituted representation’. In the case at hand, the ejidatario Mariano Moreno Guzmán – founder of San Sebastián Bachajón – was an appropriate substitute representative because his legal action sought to defend the collective rights of his fellow ejido members in the face of the Ejidal Commission’s complicity in the acts of dispossession initiated by both the government authorities of Chiapas and of Mexico. These acts had begun on February 2nd 2011, when a police operation (involving around 800 officers) took land (which remains under their control by force and without the consent of the General Assembly of Ejido Inhabitants) with the support of the Ejidal Commission – with the aim of facilitating privatisation of resources and the establishment of a tourism Megaproject.
The Collegial Court recognised the legitimate legal action of Mariano Moreno Guzmán, and thus referred the case to the Mexican Supreme Court – with the hope that it would resolve Moreno’s case once and for all. The following motives were given for this referral:
- The current issue could be transcendent in importance because, if the actions of the responsible authorities were in fact illegal, the Court would have to proclaim that they had violated fundamental rights – in particular the rights of indigenous communities – and deprived people of their land. It would also have to recognise that these actions were committed under the guise of security and social harmony in the area – where a toll booth had been constructed, along with an emergency response centre of the institute of Civilian Protection of the State of Chiapas.
- The constitutionality of the actions – justified by the authorisation of an ejidal nucleus – is questioned by the plaintiff, who points out that the authorities carried out the dispossession with the presence of elements of public security forces. Therefore, the Supreme Court would need to clarify up to what point indigenous communities are able to validate such an action.
Allegations of violations of the human rights of indigenous peoples to the ownership and possession of their land have been made. The interpretation and application of the Mexican Constitution and numerous international agreements, which protect these rights, must therefore be analysed. Such rulings would also have an impact on similar cases in which, in the name of ensuring social harmony, fundamental and substantive rights of ejidal communities have been affected.- The issue of refusal of and lack of access to the justice system for indigenous communities is also relevant to this case, as is the upholding of their right to consultation – their right to give their free and informed consent before any legislative or administrative measure that may affect them is adopted. The case also concerns the right to cultural identity and the protection, use, possession, and enjoyment of their territories. These rights are protected by the Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention of the International Labour Organization (ILO-convention 169) and the UN’s Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples – which was incorporated in Mexico’s constitutional system in the reforms of June 10th 2011.
- Finding a solution to the conflicts generated by depriving indigenous communities of their territorial rights is of international concern, as is the protection of their human rights in the face of harassment and intimidation by State authorities. However, the plaintiff argues that a dignified and preferential treatment of this issue has not been received from the responsible state and federal authorities.
- It shouldn’t go unnoticed that, in recent years, numerous reforms have been made to the Mexican Constitution regarding indigenous rights (such as the Law for Dialogue, Reconciliation, and Dignified Peace in Chiapas), along with a series of peace agreements in the state. Nor should the fact that indigenous movements with a military character (such as the EZLN) have surfaced in Chiapas be ignored.
- From the points mentioned above, the case at hand could ensure the creation of orienting criteria regarding the protection of indigenous rights and the effect this has on the implementation of government projects in indigenous areas. Without a doubt, the importance of this case rests in the analysis of the constitutionality of the actions denounced by the plaintiff – which allegedly violate the fundamental rights of ownership, possession, and enjoyment of the ejido lands that he represents.
- All of the above merits the consideration of the Mexican Supreme Court, because this case represents both a legal question and a constitutional question (in whether or not state authorities can dispossess indigenous people of their territories under the guise of seeking social harmony in said territories).
- It is necessary to analyse the responsibility of the State in violating human rights by not complying with the appropriate social, political, and economic measures required for the solution of social conflict – especially in the context of a public lack of security and conflicts between communities in indigenous areas.
The possible action of the Supreme Court regarding this case would allow for the development of the legal rulings that could benefit the indigenous communities of Mexico. We will keep you informed about the progress of this process.
–
Ricardo Lagunes
(52) 961 157 69 24
@defensalegalsur
1st October, 2014
http://kolectivozero.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/tercer-tribunal-colegiado-en-tuxtla.html
Translation by Oso Sabio
************************************************************************************
Ejido San Sebastian Bachajón attends the 80th anniversary of the ejido Tila. “It is the organised people who command, enough of discrimination and dispossession. No to the San Cristóbal – Palenque highway, and other megaprojects”, they say. “Freedom for political prisoners!” they demand.
Justice for Bachajón! Today, 16th October, it is a month since detention and torture of the three indigenous Tzeltales from the community of Virgin de Dolores in the Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón.
After 30 days of unjust detention, the conditions under which they are detained in prison in Yajalón are deplorable, because, as members of the collective #MasDe131 and the Network against Repression who visited them make clear, they are in need of medical attention, because the wounds resulting from the blows to which they were subjected have yet to heal.
****************************************************************************
Words from San Sebastián Bachajón during the gathering celebrating “522 years of indigenous resistance to the European invasion,” Ejido Los Llanos, 12th October, 2014
From the “Day of Race” to the Day Of Resistance: The Harm Caused by the Road from San Cristobal to Palenque. By: Aldabi Olvera
Through the voice of the indigenous Tzeltal and Tzotzil communities, original peoples of Chiapas, the demand to stop the federal project resonates in the Highlands of Chiapas through narratives that describe the harassment and pressure from the government, despite the lands being reclaimed during the Zapatista uprising.
12th October, “Columbus Day”: the commemoration of the “discovery of America”, when 522 years ago sailors arrived from Europe. The discovery turned out to be nothing more than the imposition of a system for the “new” continent.
Since then, dispossessed, persecuted and cornered in the forests and mountains, the indigenous lost part of their lands.
In Mexico, on the first of January 1994, only two years after the five hundredth anniversary of the “Day of the Race”, the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) rose up in arms and took back what are now known as the recuperated territories, stolen by the might of the local caciques.
Twenty years after the Zapatista uprising, these same lands are being targeted by entrepreneurs who are looking to build a road…
[…..]
Domingo Pérez, indigenous Tzeltal from San Sebastián Bachajón, speaks while his compañeros hold up a banner behind him which says: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues.
“We thank you for the opportunity to talk and to speak, and to share with you our experience of struggle and resistance. We are adherents to the Sixth (Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle). We have been in struggle for about eight years and the root of the organization (community) is that the ejido is made up of common lands, the ejidal authorities were only one and they sold out to the bad government and then the bad government with the political parties divided the ejido.”
He relates:
“Many more years ago in San Sebastián Bachajón there is a place called the waterfalls of Agua Azul, part of it belongs to the ejido and the other part to Tumbalá. Since 1980 there has been a nature reserve, but Conagua altered the co-ordinates marked on the previous plan and which affects our territory, they are planning to build hotels, golf courses and others for the benefit of the bad government and big businesses, other countries and transnationals, but the government says it is development for the communities, which is a lie.”
On 24 April, 2013, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, a member of the organization, was murdered. On 21 March, 2014, Juan Carlos Gómez was murdered. On 15 September Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano, Roberto Gómez Hernández, also from Bachajón were arrested accused of the attempted murder of police from the municipality of Chilón.
The banner shines behind him, there are the adherents with a star around an indigenous face: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues.”
“The super highway does not benefit us compañeros, and the bad government goes straight to the Commissioner without consulting with the people and assembly and went to the Ejido of Salto de Agua to sign an agreement to give passage to the super highway but not with the consent of the people.”
192 of the 206 communities of the neighbouring ejido of San Jerónimo Bachajón also declared themselves against the Highway. This decision was taken at a community assembly of nearly two thousand people in the town of Guadalupe Paxilá, on August 30, 2014.
“San Sebastián has three centres of population and 208 communities and the three centres do not know it. A few made this agreement, selling out to the bad government but we are against it because it destroys our resources. There are big mountains, rivers, waterfalls. There are compañeros whose land with their coffee plantations and crops it will cross, and we will not allow it to affect seven municipalities from San Cristobal to Palenque.”
“The government has been doing it with the death of two compañeros and with the imprisonment, but we will keep fighting, as we already said the land is not for sale, it is defended. We are people of corn, we are of the earth. We eat from her and will not allow the highway to pass. As we say in our community, not one step to the super highway.”
************************************************************************************
More Than 800 Indigenous From The Highlands And Northern Zone Of Chiapas Repeat Their Rejection Of The San Cristobal-Palenque Highway
Pozol Colectivo, October 12, 2014
Los Llanos, Chiapas, October 12. More than 800 indigenous, from communities such as Candelaria, San José el Porvenir, Nuevo Corralchem and San Sebastián Bachajón, arrive at the community of Los Llanos, in the municipality of San Cristobal de las Casas, to express their opposition to the construction of the highway from San Cristóbal to Palenque, which the government intends to build without prior consultation, as they have repeatedly denounced.
With a traditional ceremony, different communities from the Highlands and the northern zone of Chiapas, begin their meeting. “The road does not give me food, how will it benefit me,” Juan Gomez Diaz argues first, from the vigilance council of Los Llanos. “I am sick of how here they threaten to imprison me,” he continues, and affirms strongly, “If I deserve it, put me in prison, but if not, I must live in this land which has been sold.”
For his part, the representative of the community of San José el Porvenir, in the municipality of Huixtán, says that in December 1994, “It cost us a lot of blood to reclaim our land, many lost their lives,” so do not think giving up “not one more step,” he says.
In his participation, the defence lawyer for Los Llanos says that the announcement of the construction of the highway was made in November 2013; for this reason the community requested an amparo (injunction) in early 2014. The authorities’ response has been to deny that the highway would damage the lands of Los Llanos, which means that the law automatically allows the judges to dismiss the amparo, leaving the communities vulnerable, reports the defender.
The indigenous guests from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón explain that within their lands are located the tourist attraction the Waterfalls of Agua Azul, which they share with the municipality of Tumbalá, however they denounce that the National Council of the Environment (Conam), altered the coordinates of the map affecting Bachajón.
With respect to the highway, the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle said that it would not benefit them at all, and showed that in the municipality of Salto de Agua, a convention where some communities accept the superhighway had already been signed; for this reason they were also protesting in the San Miguel community of Salto de Agua on the 12thOctober. The Tzeltal Indians also took the opportunity to demand the release of their three compañeros who were recently imprisoned, despite their statements being obtained under torture.
In the following interventions, the ejido La Candelaria gave an invitation to a pilgrimage on November 25 in San Cristobal de las Casas, where they would make clear their rejection of the dispossession of their land by the highway project. The Centre for Women’s Rights in Chiapas, and communities like La Grandeza and Aguacatenango reminded Los Llanos that they are not alone, and that they have to join together with other communities to defend themselves against megaprojects.
Word also came to the meeting from the Xochicuautla community, in the State of Mexico, which is in resistance against the Naucalpan-Toluca highway which they want to impose on the community. The community, which is a member of the Indigenous National Congress, denounced that, because they are refusing to give up their lands, they continue to experience acts of provocation, persecution, harassment and intimidation towards their communal territory. The indigenous Nanhu also spoke out for justice for the students of the normal school in Ayotzinapa.
Article published here: http://www.pozol.org/?p=9922
Further Information: http://espoirchiapas.blogspot.mx/2014/10/ejidataris-de-los-llanos-defenden-la.html
VIDEOS: https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=723635324379151&set=vb.100001980700686&type=2&theater
https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=723650964377587&set=vb.100001980700686&type=2&theater
https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=723669111042439&set=vb.100001980700686&type=2&theater
ANTECEDENTES: Desde Laguna Suyul indígenas manifestan su rechazo a la Supercarretera San Cristóbal – Palenque.
Share!
***************************************************************************
Over 36 organizations from more than ten countries speak out against the unjust imprisonment of indigenous from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón
October 4, 2014
– International Organizations demand the freedom of the indigenous and hold the three levels of government responsible.
– The Network against Repression sends an invitation to the solidarity Brigade with San Sebastián Bachajón, which starts on October 10.
Mexico, October 3. More than 36 organizations and groups in countries like the United States, France, Spain, Italy, Austria, Belgium, United Kingdom, Colombia, Germany and New Zealand are speaking out against the unjust imprisonment of indigenous from the community of Virgen de Dolores in the ejido San Sebastian Bachajón, Chiapas.
The internationals in solidarity explained that on September 16, 2014, Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar and Silvano Roberto Gómez Hernández, members of the community of Virgen de Dolores, which is part of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, were arrested and subjected to acts of torture and cruel, inhuman and/or degrading treatment committed by members of the Chilón Municipal Police, in order to force them sign a self-incriminating confession, as documented by the Fray Bartolome de Las Casas Human Rights Centre.
They add that the Tseltal indigenous were forced to put their fingerprint on a statement which was not read to them, although none of the three can read or write; and they did not have a translator, nor a lawyer they trust to assist them during their statement, although their mother language is Tseltal. They note that the three ejidatarios have now been sent to prison by the judge who issued the formal order for imprisonment for the crime of attempted murder, even though their confessions were obtained under torture.
The organizations demand the release of the indigenous and report that they will be monitoring the situation closely and will remain vigilant as to what may happen. “We hold the three levels of government, and especially Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, Manuel Velasco Coello and Enrique Peña Nieto, responsible for the security and integrity of the prisoners, and for any kind of violence, attacks, killings or harassment and intimidation that may occur,” they warn.
Meanwhile, the Network against Repression and for Solidarity sends an invitation to the Brigade of solidarity with San Sebastián Bachajón, which will leave the city of Mexico on Friday 10 October, to attend the Meeting of Peoples and Communities to be held on 12 October, in the Ejido Los Llanos, municipality of San Cristobal de las Casas, from 8.00. San Sebastián Bachajón, San Jose Los Llanos and El Porvenir will be at the meeting of “those who continue to defend the land and territory.” “Now they struggle against the construction of the San Cristóbal de Las Casas – Palenque highway,” the Network says.
At the same time, San Sebastián’s defence lawyer reports that in the session on September 29, 2014, the Third Collegiate Court in Tuxtla Gutierrez, in the resolution of Amparo in Review 224/2014, filed by the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle from San Sebastián Bachajón against the dismissal of amparo 274/2011 issued by the Seventh District Judge in Tuxtla Gutierrez, unanimously reverses that judgment and orders the case to be sent to the Supreme Court to exercise its power of judgement due to the relevance and importance of the matter in the International law of Indigenous Peoples.
http://kolectivozero.blogspot.mx/
*******************************************************************************
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 27 SEPTEMBER, 2014
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeras and compañeros
We denounce that the bad government is giving more punishment to our compañeros Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández because it has now changed their crime from aggravated assault to the attempted murder of Chilón municipal police agent Alfredo Bernabé Aguilar Fuentes, so that they do not get out on bail and remain unjustly in prison for longer, since it is a crime they did not commit, a crime fabricated by the bad government; this is why the bad government had to mistreat and torture our compañeros, while they were there for nine hours of pure torture from the municipal police of Chilón, but then also later the agent of the public ministry of Ocosingo, Rodolfo Gómez Gutiérrez, put a pistol to the head of compañero Mario Aguilar Silvano, and also put a bag over his head.
The licensed judge omar heleria reyes is an accomplice of the bad government; he only signed the order for formal imprisonment because he was ordered to do so by the government, his boss. The judges of our peoples do not act in that way; wisdom and intelligence are needed to resolve problems, but what these people do is violate rights and protect those who do the dirty work of the bad government.
We denounce that our compañeros Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández, prisoners in cereso 16 in Ocosingo, Chiapas are being asked for money by those called spokespersons or precisos who coordinate with the prison authorities; this is why we demand that the bad government respects the life and integrity of our compañeros because they are political prisoners and no person should be troubled in prison by being forced to give money or do work against their personal dignity.
We demand that the bad government releases immediately our compañeros JUAN ANTONIO GOMEZ SILVANO, MARIO AGUILAR SILVANO AND ROBERTO GOMEZ HERNANDEZ, who were tortured by the bad government, and who have been unjustly deprived of their freedom since September 16, 2014 for fighting for justice and defending their territory.
We also demand the release of our imprisoned compañeros SANTIAGO MORENO PEREZ, a prisoner since 2009 in Playas de Catazajá, EMILIO JIMENEZ GOMEZ, a prisoner since July 2014 in Playas de Catazajá and compañero ESTEBAN GOMEZ JIMENEZ , a prisoner since 2013 in Playas de Catazajá and later transferred to El Amate.
We demand that the bad government and the pro-government ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón, Alejandro Moreno Gómez, do not continue dispossessing our people of their territory and natural resources, because the people are going to continue defending them.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón send our combative greetings.
Never again a Mexico without us
Attentively
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
International Pronouncement on the unjust imprisonment of three compañeros from Virgen de Dolores in the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón
–
Faced with the recent arrest, torture and imprisonment on false charges of three ejidatarios from the recuperated lands of Virgen de Dolores, we find it necessary once again to express our solidarity with our compañer@s, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, and our anger and indignation at the repression they continue to experience from the bad government and the forces of capitalism.
The ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón are engaged in an ongoing struggle against the plunder and dispossession of their lands by the three levels of government and transnational corporations who wish to profit from a world class ecotourist megaproject they plan to build there. As a direct result of their resistance, two of their compañeros have been assassinated with high calibre gunshots, Juan Vázquez Guzmán on April 24, 2013 and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano on March 13, 2014.
On 16th September, 2014, Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández, three Tseltal indigenous from the community of Virgen de Dolores, part of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, were threatened with firearms and arrested by members of the municipal police from Chilón.
The Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Centre has documented what occurred and confirms that the detained were subjected to acts of torture and cruel, inhuman and/or degrading treatment committed by members of the Chilón Municipal Police in order to force them to incriminate themselves; they were forced to put their fingerprint on a statement which was not read to them, although none of the three can read or write; and they did not have a translator, nor a lawyer they trust to assist them during their statement, although their mother language is Tseltal. The three have now been formally imprisoned for the crime of attempted murder – the shooting and wounding of an officer of the municipal police in Ocosingo, even though their confessions were obtained under torture.
We demand:
- investigations of the municipal police of Chilón and the Prosecutor of the Public Ministry of Ocosingo, for the crime of torture
- that the evidence illegally obtained under torture be discarded
- immediate freedom for the prisoners Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández
- justice and full respect for the rights of the people of San Sebastián Bachajón
- an end to the criminalisation of those who struggle for the wellbeing of their peoples and in defence of their natural resources and the mother earth
We will monitor the situation closely and remain vigilant as to what may happen. We hold the three levels of government, and especially Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, Manuel Velasco Coello and Enrique Peña Nieto, responsible for the safety and integrity of the prisoners and for any violence, attacks, killings or acts of harassment and intimidation that may occur.
We know that the just struggle of the compañeros will continue, with the support of people of good heart from Mexico and the world. As their struggle will not end, neither will our solidarity.
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
ALUMNXS DE LA ESCUELITA ZAPATISTA (Seattle, tierra ancestral de los Duwamish y Suquamish), US
Asociacion Espoir Chiapas / Esperanza Chiapas. France
ASSI (Acción Social Sindical Internacionalista)
Associació Solidaria Cafè Rebeldía-Infoespai, Barcelona
Associazione Ya Basta! Milano
Caracol mundo-eco de latido en solidaridad, Austria
Caracol Solidario, Besançon, France
Casa Nicaragua, Belgium
Centro de Documentación sobre Zapatismo –CEDOZ-, Spanish State
CGT-Estado Español, Spanish State
Chiapas Support Committee, US
Committee of the True Word for South-West England
Committee of the True Word, Western Colombia
Comitato Chiapas “Maribel” – Bergamo, Italy
Decolonial Food For Thought, US
Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, England
Edinburgh Chiapas Solidarity Group, Scotland
Groupe Cafez de Liège, Belgium
Gruppe B.A.S.T.A., Münster, Germany
Julie Webb-Pullman, New Zealand
KIPTIK, Bristol, England
la Adhesiva, espai de Trobada i Acció, Barcelona
La Plataforma de Solidaridad con Chiapas y Guatemala de Madrid
les trois passants, Paris, France
London Mexico Solidarity Group, England
Manchester Zapatista Collective, England
Movement for Justice in El Barrio, US
Mut Vitz 13, Marseille, France
Red de El Norte en Apoyo a la Sexta, US
UK Zapatista Learning and Teaching Collective
UK Zapatista Translation Service
UK Zapatista Solidarity Network
UK Zap Sol
Wellington Zapatista Support Group, New Zealand
Zapatista Solidarity Group – Essex, England
*******************************************************************************
Judge adds more charges against 3 indigenous from Bachajón, who were arrested and tortured, ejido owners accuse
** The intention of the Chilón and Ocosingo authorities is that they cannot get out on bail, they claim
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
A judge added charges against the three indigenous from San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, in order to prevent their freedom, after being tortured and threatened with a pistol during interrogation in the Ocosingo holding cell.
Their compañeros, ejido owners adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, claim that it is an act of reprisal by the Chilón municipal police and the judicial authorities of Ocosingo for the incarceration of a municipal police agent who participated in the 21 March execution of Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, leader of Virgen Dolores community. One of those imprisoned on false charges is the murdered leader’s brother.
“The bad government is giving more punishment to our compañeros Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández, because now it has changed their crime from aggravated assault to the attempted murder of Chilón municipal police agent Alfredo Bernabé Aguilar Fuentes, so that they do not get out on bail and remain unjustly in prison for longer, since it is a crime they did not commit. “This is why the bad government mistreated our compañeros for nine hours, and also later the Public Ministry [1] agent, Rodolfo Gómez Gutiérrez, put a pistol to the head of compañero Mario Aguilar.”
They ask them for money
The Tzeltal ejido owners also denounce that their prisoner compañeros in Cereso 16 of Ocosingo “are being asked for money by those called spokespersons or precisos who coordinate with the prison authorities.”
They accuse Judge Omar Heleria Reyes of being “an accomplice of the bad government, because he only signs the order for formal prison because the government, his boss, orders him to do it. The judges of our peoples do not act in that way; wisdom and intelligence are needed to resolve problems, but what these people do is violate rights and protect the dirty work of the bad government.”
The indigenous demand the immediate liberation of their compañeros, “tortured and unjustly deprived of their freedom since 16 September for struggling for justice and the defence of their territory.”
They also demanded the release of Santiago Moreno Pérez, a prisoner since 2009, and of Emilio Jiménez Gómez, incarcerated since July 2014, both at the Playas de Catazajá prison, as well as Esteban Gómez Jiménez, who was moved to the El Amate prison.
“We demand that the bad government and the pro-government ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón, Alejandro Moreno Gómez, do not continue dispossessing our people of the territory and natural resources, because we are going to continue defending it,” the authorities of the indigenous in resistance said in conclusion.
[1] The Public Ministry in Mexico is similar to the crown prosecutor in the UK.
———————————————————-
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Tuesday, September 30, 2014
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2014/09/30/politica/019n1pol
English translation by the Chiapas Support Committee for the International Zapatista Translation Service
********************************************************************************
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJÓN, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 24 SEPTEMBER, 2014
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeras and compañeros
On September 16, 2014, at about 4 am, 40 members of the municipal police from Chilón, under the command of commander Francisco Sanchez Guzman, arrested and tortured our compañeros Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández, accusing them of shooting a member of the Chilón municipal police whose name is Alfredo Bernabé Aguilar Fuentes. Two compañeros from the organization who were not arrested at that time managed to get to the community of Virgen de Dolores to give news of the arrest and the compañeros being taken to an unknown destination.
At 6 am, relatives of the three detainees and authorities of the organization went to look for the compañeros in the police station in Chilón, but they denied that they were there, then we went to the Public Ministry in Ocosingo where they also denied that they were there, then we went to the office of the General Prosecutor of the Republic in Ocosingo but they also said that they knew nothing, we told them that we wanted to give them something to eat and to know how they were, by this time it was about 1.00 in the afternoon.
As no authority of the bad government was saying where the compañeros were held, we submitted an amparo concerning their detention, being held incommunicado, torture and possible forced disappearance. The families of the three detainees went to the police headquarters at Yajalón to continue looking for the compañeros around 3 pm, but they also gave them no information and so they returned to the community of Virgen de Dolores at 6 in the afternoon and the authorities went to the prison in Ocosingo, but we did not find them.
At 6pm compañeros from the organization who were still searching for the three compañeros in Ocosingo learned that they were in the cells of the municipal police in Ocosingo and their families quickly brought food and arrived at about 8 pm, but even so they would not allow the relatives to see them, but just took the food because they could not see them.
On September 17, 2014, at 10 in the morning we were able to see the three compañeros in the public ministry of Ocosingo, this was when we saw that all the compañeros had been beaten, we wanted to speak with them but they were surrounded by municipal police who kept the prosecution surrounded and only allowed the relatives to pass through but not the authorities but they were making a statement with no translator and no lawyer.
Through information from the three prisoner compañeros we know that they were tortured by Rodolfo Gómez Gutiérrez from the Public Ministry who pointed a gun at the head of compañero Mario Aguilar Silvano and put a bag over his head forcing him to incriminate himself.
In the evening of the same day they were forced to sign documents without knowing their contents and the three compañeros were also informed that they could go out on bail, so for this reason the compañeros were able to communicate with compañeros from Virgen de Dolores who came to the public ministry of Ocosingo at 11 pm, but they did not want to let them see them then and a guard told them that they would not see them until 7 am the next day.
It was only on 18 September, 2014, when the relatives were able to speak to Octavio López Martínez from the Public Ministry who told them that they would have to stand bail for an amount of 35,000 pesos each. At that time members of the Frayba human rights centre also arrived with a doctor to certify the torture of our compañeros in the cells of the municipal police of Ocosingo where they could only see Mario Aguilar Silvano, because the term of the public prosecutor to resolve their legal status had expired, so then at about 1 pm they were taken to the prison in Ocosingo where they finally finished certificating the two compañeros Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández.
On 19 September 2014, the Ocosingo Judge Omar Heleria Reyes set bail for our compañeros of 332,000 pesos each, and at 1.25 pm on that day his time to resolve the legal situation of our compañeros expired.
Our prisoner compañeros were able to identify among the Chilón municipal police who arrested them one by the name of Agustin Sanchez Jimenez, who is a friend and neighbour of Sebastian Mendez Hernandez who is currently in prison at El Amate for the murder of our compañero Juan Carlos Gomez Silvano in the morning of March 21, 2014, near the community of Virgen de Dolores, where he was killed with more than 20 gunshots. For this reason we consider it an act of revenge against our organization for looking for those responsible for the murder of our compañero Juan Carlos.
We demand that the bad government release immediately our compañeros JUAN ANTONIO GOMEZ SILVANO, MARIO AGUILAR SILVANO and ROBERTO GOMEZ HERNANDEZ who were tortured by the bad government and are prisoners in the prison (cereso) of Ocosingo.
Our organization will continue to fight for the defence of our territory from the bad government which has plundered it since February 2011 in order to impose world class ecotourism projects and has given over our lands to the national Commission for natural protected areas even though this is part of our lands, it is not in the decree of Agua Azul, all with the complicity of former ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzman Jimenez also known as the goyito and the current ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez.
We also demand the release of our compañeros SANTIAGO MORENO PEREZ imprisoned since 2009 in Playas de Catazajá for a crime he did not commit, also of EMILIO JIMENEZ GOMEZ imprisoned since July 2014 in Playas de Catazajá for a crime he did not commit and compañero ESTEBAN GOMEZ JIMENEZ imprisoned since 2013 in Playas de Catazajá and then transferred to El Amate, for crimes he did not commit.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas we send combative greetings to all the compañeros and compañeras who defend the mother earth from capitalist projects of dispossession.
Never again a Mexico without us
Attentively
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
***********************************************************************************
Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Centre, A.C.
San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas, Mexico
24 September 2014
Press Release No.26
Torture of Indigenous Tzeltal Adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
The Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Centre (Frayba) has documented acts of torture and cruel, inhuman and/or degrading treatment committed by members of the Chilón Municipal Police against the Tzeltal indigenous Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Roberto Gómez Hernández and Mario Aguilar Silvano (hereinafter Juan Antonio, Roberto and Mario), adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle. The events occurred on 16 September, 2014, in the county seat of Chilón, Chiapas, Mexico.
According to information in the possession of Frayba, on September 16, at approximately 04.00 hrs, while they were heading home, Juan Antonio, Roberto and Mario were arrested by a group of approximately 40 municipal police from Chilón.
From that moment they were beaten with fists and kicked, had gas sprayed in their eyes, were handcuffed and each was put into a truck belonging to the Chilón municipal police; already subdued, and face downwards they trod on their backs and hands to immobilize them. At the headquarters of the Municipal Police the beatings and spraying of gas in their eyes continued, while interrogating them on the carrying of two firearms and injuries to a municipal policeman. The three Tzeltal indigenous indicated that they knew nothing about the acts the police were questioning them about.
On 17 September, now in the Prosecutor’s Office of the Public Ministry in Ocosingo, Chiapas, they were again beaten in the presence of Rodolfo Manuel Gomez Gutierrez, officer of the Public Ministry. According to documentation they tried to asphyxiate Mario with a plastic bag and beat him on the head with the palm of the hand insisting that he confess with regard to the firearm and that he incriminate himself for having shot and injured a policeman. Meanwhile Roberto was pressured psychologically to accuse the two compañeros, with the argument that they had incriminated him.
The three indigenous were forced to put their fingerprint on the ministerial statement, which was not read to them. It is important to state that none of the three can read or write, and in addition their native language is Tzeltal. There is information that the detainees did not have a translator, nor a lawyer they trust to assist them during their ministerial statement. They were committed on 18 September to appear before Judge Omar Heredia Reyes for the crime of aggravated assault.
On giving their initial statement before Judge Omar Heredia, it was achieved that he would give judicial testimony as to their injuries, asking the prosecutor from the Public Ministry to initiate appropriate investigations in to probable acts of torture, sustaining them in the State Law for the Prevention and Punishment of Torture. Given what has just been told, Frayba is concerned about the performance of the Municipal Police of Chilón and the Public Ministry of Ocosingo, for the use of torture as a method of police investigation.
We request the Attorney General of the state of Chiapas conduct the appropriate investigations against the municipal police of Chilón and the Prosecutor of the Public Ministry, Rodolfo Manuel Gómez Gutiérrez, for the crime of torture as it is defined in the Criminal Code the state of Chiapas, and the other crimes that result.
Also, the judge hearing the case of Juan Antonio, Roberto and Mario must put aside the legal evidence obtained under torture.
Background: During the celebrations of the Mexican independence festival, on the morning of 16 September, in the county seat of the municipality of Chilón, several gun shots were heard when a member of the Chilón municipal police was injured. Juan Antonio, Robert and Mario attended these celebrations and were walking home when they were stopped and accused of shooting the injured policeman.
http://www.frayba.org.mx/archivo/boletines/140924_boletin_26_tortura_tseltales.pdf
*******************************************************************************
Ocosingo Judge Omar Heleria Reyes issues detention order against Tzeltal indigenous who were forced to testify under torture
Chiapas, Mexico. September 24. Ocosingo Judge Omar Heleria Reyes has issued a detention order against three ejidatarios from San Sebastián Bachajón, despite the Fray Bartolome de Las Casas Human Rights Centre (Frayba) documenting acts of torture and cruel, inhuman and/or degrading treatment committed by members of the Chilon Municipal Police against the Tzeltales. “The three Indians, who cannot read or write, were forced to put their fingerprint on the ministerial statement which was not read to them, and they also did not have a translator,” denounces the Human Rights Centre.
Frayba also requests the General Prosecutor of Justice of the state of Chiapas to “conduct the appropriate investigations against the Chilón municipal police and the prosecutor of the Public Ministry, Rodolfo Manuel Gómez Gutiérrez for the crime of torture”, as Mario Aguilar , one of the detainees, denounced that they tried to asphyxiate him with a plastic bag and gave him blows to the head with the palm of the hand, insisting that he make a confession regarding the firearm and incriminate himself with having shot and injured a Municipal policeman.
Moreover, in a press conference the indigenous from San Sebastián Bachajón, along with their legal representative, denounced that in the case of their compañeros, the prisoners Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández from the Virgen de Dolores community “the law was not respected, because they were not presented to the prosecutor from the public ministry who is 5 minutes away from the place of their arrest.” “They were nine hours in police custody without being brought before him” they reveal.
The three Tzeltal indigenous were arrested on September 16, by Commander Francisco Sánchez Guzmán, who accused them of shooting at police from Chilón municipality, even though the sodium radizonate chemical tests were negative. The arrests were made at 4:30 am and the officer presented them to the public ministry of Ocosingo at 1:30 in the afternoon, the defence lawyer reports.
“They were very badly beaten, on the face and body, with internal injuries that were certified by the prosecution” adds the lawyer. When the police were questioned about the reason for the delay in presenting the detainees, they replied that it was because they had to keep doing patrols in the county seat and because of the bad weather in the region, the human rights defender also explains and adds that the supreme court determines that all the elements resulting from an arrest like that of the Tzeltal indigenous are illegal.
During the press conference it was reported that they had reclassified the offence of the ejidatarios from Bachajón, from aggravated wounding to attempted murder, so they cannot get bail. The defence states that they will apply for an indirect amparo (order for legal protection or injunction) against the order for imprisonment, due the serious crimes invented against the indigenous.
***********************************************************************
.
3 Tzeltal Indigenous imprisoned in Chilón on false charges
** Frayba accuses the use of torture to obtain confessions
** They are accused of injuring a police agent at the festivities on Sept 16
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
The Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Human Rights Centre (Frayba), along with the Tzeltal ejido owners of San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, denounced the detention, torture and imprisonment on false charges of Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández. The Frayba documented “cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment, committed by members of the Chilón municipal police against indigenous adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle.”
The organisation reports that on September 16, towards 4 o’clock in the morning, some 40 police arrested the 3 men while they were heading home. “From that moment they were punched and kicked, they sprayed gas in their eyes, they were handcuffed and put in a municipal police truck, already submitted and face down they stepped on their backs and hands to immobilize them.” The blows and the gas spray continued at the command post, “interrogating them about two firearms and injuries to a police agent.” The accused said that they knew nothing about the acts.
On September 17, now in the office of the Public Ministry (Ministerio Público, MP) [1] in Ocosingo, they were beaten in the presence of Rodolfo Manuel Gómez Gutiérrez, an MP agent. “They provoked the asphyxiation of Mario with a plastic bag and punched him in the head with the palm of their hand, insisting that he confess with respect to the firearm and incriminate himself with having shot and injured a police agent.”
The indigenous were obliged to put their fingerprint on a statement which they did not read to them. Frayba emphasizes that they don’t know how to read or write, also that their language is Tzeltal. “They didn’t have a translator or a trustworthy lawyer.” On September 18, they were assigned to prison. “On rendering their preparatory statement before Judge Omar Heredia, they achieved that he would take judicial notice of their injuries, asking the MP’s prosecutor to initiate appropriate investigations in to probable acts of torture, supporting them with the State Law for the Prevention and Punishment of Torture.” Frayba questions the behaviour of the Chilón municipal police and the MP’s agency in Ocosingo “for the use of torture as a method of police investigation.”
The organisation asks the state’s Attorney General of Justice to investigate the behaviour of the police agents and of agent Gómez Gutiérrez of the MP “for the crime of torture, described in the Chiapas Penal Code.” Besides, it warns, “the judge who is hearing the case against Juan Antonio, Roberto and Mario, must throw out the illegal evidence obtained under torture.”
During the Independence Day festivities in the early morning of September 16, shots were heard in the municipal capital of Chilón and a police agent was wounded. Juan Antonio, Roberto and Mario were at the festivities and were walking to their homes when they were arrested and accused of shooting the injured police agent, Alfredo Bernabé Aguilar Fuentes.
The Tzeltal ejido owners say that the apprehension and torture of their compañeros were carried out on the orders of the municipal commander Francisco Sanchez Guzmán. For several hours, no official agency acknowledged having the detainees. They were able to see them on September 17 in Ocosingo: “They were all beaten. We wanted to speak with them but the municipal police had surrounded the legal office and only allowed family members to pass through, not the community authorities.” They were tortured by the MP; he pointed a pistol at Mario’s head “so that he would incriminate himself.”
The prisoners identified among their captors the police agent Agustín Sánchez Jiménez, “a friend and neighbour of Sebastián Méndez Hernández, currently imprisoned for the murder of Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano (on March 21, near Virgen de Dolores, where they fired more than 20 shots at him).” The ejido owners consider that: “it is in revenge for seeking those responsible for the murder of our compañero.”
The ejido owners also demand the release of Santiago Moreno López and Esteban Gómez Jiménez, incarcerated at Playas de Catazajá (since 2009 and 2013, respectively) on false charges, as part of the continuing persecution of the ejido owners.
______________________
Translator’s Note: [1]. The local Public Ministry is a local Prosecutor’s office.
—————————————–
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Thursday, September 25, 2014
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2014/09/25/politica/016n1pol
**********************************************************************
Three Tzeltales accused of injuring Chilón police
** They are Sexta adherents; they allege political revenge
By: Hermann Bellinghausen,
San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas, September 19, 2014
Three indigenous adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, from the community of Virgen de Dolores –Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández– were assigned (to prison) by the Public Minister (MP) ascribed to the Specialized Prosecutor in Indigenous Justice of Chilón today. As a consequence, these San Sebastián Bachajón ejido owners were sent to the mixed judge of Ocosingo, accused of the aggravated injury of members of the Chilón municipal police, for acts the occurred in the early hours of September 16.
Expeditiously, Ocosingo judge, Omar Heleria Reyes, set bail at 300,000 pesos for each one of the detainees. According to their lawyer, Ricardo Lagunes Gasca, this “is completely unconstitutional, because of being an amount disproportionate to the compañeros’ economic situation, which violates the principle of presumption of innocence.” Besides, it leaves the detainees “without the real possibility of enjoying the constitutional right to confront their criminal proceedings in freedom.”
According to the defense lawyer for the three Tzeltales, the three assure that “during the time that they were in the custody of members of the Chilón municipal police (the ones who apprehended them) they were subjected to cruel treatment and torture; they threw them to the ground and dragged them on the dirt road, provoking grave injuries on their bodies, while the police were laughing at them.”
The detainees point out that Rodolfo Gómez Gutiérrez, MP (prosecutor) ascribed to the Specialized Office in Indigenous Justice in Ocosingo, who aided the Chilón MP in the putting the investigation together, “tortured Mario Aguilar Silvano so that he would incriminate himself in the acts they impute to him and would sign a confession; he pointed a pistol at his head, placed a plastic bag on him to provoke asphyxia and hit him in the face with an open hand more than once.” That occurred during the afternoon of September 17, Lagunes Gasca points out.
At the same time, “the three Sexta adherents point out that at the time of their arrest, they identified one of the apprehending police as Agustín Sánchez, who lives close to Virgen de Dolores community, in Carmen Xaquilá, and who in turn is a close friend and neighbor of Sebastián Méndez Hernández, who participated in the assassination of Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano on March 21, 2014 and who is now secluded in El Amate Prison under criminal prosecution.”
Those detained assure that members of the Chilón municipal police “are taking reprisals against members of Virgen de Dolores community” for the arrest of a member of their (police) corporation.
The constitutional time period for resolving the legal situation of Tzeltal ejido owners Gómez Silvano, Aguilar Silvano and Gómez Hernández expires next Wednesday, September 24. “We will assert all means of defence to obtain their freedom within this time period,” the lawyer for the indigenous concludes.
————————————————————
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Saturday, September 20, 2014
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2014/09/20/politica/019n1pol
English translation by the Chiapas Support Committee for the International Zapatista Translation Service
********************************************************************************
Police aggression against three San Sebastián Bachajón ejido members is denounced
**They are presumed responsible for injuring a Chilón (police) agent
By: Hermann Bellinghausen,
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, September 17, 2014
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, a regional coordinator of the Sixth in Chilón, executed with more than 20 gunshots last March 21 on the road to his community, Virgen de Dolores. Photo: provided by the Gómez Silvano family
San Sebastián Bachajón ejido owners denounced that in the early hours of Tuesday, three of their compañeros were detained, and disappeared for several hours, after Chilón municipal police, the municipality to which the ejido belongs, attacked them with firearms. They fear that it is revenge for the incarceration of an agent of said police, accused of murdering Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano last March.
Currently, the three are in the custody of the Public Ministry (MP, its initials in Spanish) of the State’s Attorney General of Justice (PGJE) in Ocosingo. The detainees’ defence told La Jornada that they are considered “probably responsible for the aggravated injury of the Chilón municipal police [officer].” As of this afternoon, the family members and compañeros of the Sixth from San Sebastián Bachajón stayed at the Public Ministry in Ocosingo “waiting to gain access to the detainees.”
The ejido owners filed for a protective order: “because of illegal arrest, being held incommunicado, torture and forced disappearance, pointing to various federal authorities as well as local Chiapas authorities, since the family was several hours (up to 18 hours on the 16th) without knowing about them.” The MP of Ocosingo was already notified of the protective order.
At one o’clock in the morning on the 16th, Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano, Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hernández, from Virgen de Dolores community, were attacked “and taken away in an unknown direction, when they were walking in the direction of their community coming from Chilón, the municipal capital,” the Indigenous adherents of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle denounced.
Another two of their compañeros were able to escape from the aggression of the municipal police and reach the community to report the acts. The Tzeltal ejido owners denounced that their whereabouts were unknown for the entire day. “They searched in different police agencies in Chilón and Ocosingo and also presented a protective order for their disappearance.”
One of the detainees is the brother of Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, the representative of his community, who was murdered on March 21 “with more than 20 gunshots, carried out by a group of people who acted with impunity.” Weeks after the murder, “compañeros from the community detained two of the aggressors and delivered them to the ministerial authorities. Now, those two individuals are found under criminal process in El Amate (prison). Their names are Sebastián Méndez Hernández (Chilón municipal police agent at the time of the murder) and Jerónimo Hernández Gómez.”
The ejido owners, adherents to the Sixth, “have a well-founded fear that this aggression is in reprisal for the detention of the municipal police agent Méndez Hernández, who participated in the assassination of our compañero.” One day before, the Indigenous had carried out an occupation and intermittent roadblock at the Agua Azul crossroad, in defence of their territory.
———————————————————–
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Thursday, September 18, 2014
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2014/09/18/politica/014n2pol
English translation by the Chiapas Support Committee for the International Zapatista Translation Service
***********************************************************************************
Bachajón ejido owners reject the super highway
** They state their “energetic” opposition to the dispossession of their lands
By: Hermann Bellinghausen,
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, September 16, 2014
San Sebastián Bachajón’s Tzeltal ejido owners blocked the Ocosingo-Palenque Highway this Monday, at the Agua Azul crossroad, against the construction of the planned San Cristóbal de las Casas-Palenque Toll Road, and to demonstrate their “energetic rejection” of the dispossession of their territory. “We are not going to permit the government to take away our Mother Earth for their death projects that are only for the benefit of capitalists, not for our people.”
The Indigenous, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, demanded that the pro-government ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez “stop betraying the people by delivering their lands to the bad government for tourist projects and the construction of the toll road.” During the intermittent roadblock carried out yesterday, the ejido owners declared that they will not permit the government “to continue delivering the lands that our grandparents left to us.”
The mobilization was also to remember that their murdered compañeros Juan Vázquez Guzmán (April 24, 2013) and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano (March 13, 2014) “gave their lives for the defence of Mother Earth and they defended their town from the ambition and corruption of the bad governments.” They also demanded the freedom “of our Tzeltal compañeros (that are) unjustly imprisoned: Santiago Moreno Pérez (2009) and Emilio Jiménez Gómez (2014) in the Playas de Catazajá prison and compañero Esteban Gómez Jiménez (2013) in the El Amate Prison.
———————————————————–
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Wednesday, September 17, 2014
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2014/09/17/politica/025n2pol
English translation by the Chiapas Support Committee for the International Zapatista Translation Service
***************************************************************************
APPEAL FOR SOLIDARITY WITH THE COMPAS OF VIRGEN DE DOLORES IN THE EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON
At 1.00 am on 16/9/14 police from Chilon detain three Tseltales, adherents to the Sixth, from Virgen Dolores…….
Their whereabouts is unknown: Juan Antonio Gómez Silvano Mario Aguilar Silvano and Roberto Gómez Hdz
An amparo has been filed for possible detention, torture and forced disappearance……..
The community of Virgen de Dolores fears for the safety of the three and asks for solidarity.
***
Urgent Information from the community of Virgen de Dolores
.
.
Compañeras and compañeros,
We inform you that today at 1 am the compañeros JUAN ANTONIO GOMEZ SILVANO, MARIO AGUILAR SILVANO and ROBERTO GOMEZ HERNANDEZ, from the community of Virgen de Dolores (official municipality of Chilón, Chiapas,) were attacked with firearms by members of the Municipal Police from Chilón when they were walking towards Virgen de Dolores from the municipal seat of Chilón community, and taken to an unknown destination.
Two compañeros managed to escape the aggression of the municipal police and managed to get to the community to report what had happened, but so far the whereabouts of the three compañeros is unknown. Today we looked for them at various police units in Chilón and Ocosingo and also filed an amparo for their disappearance, but so far we do not know where they are or whether they are well.
One of the missing compañeros is the brother of the deceased compañero Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano who was brutally murdered the morning of March 21, 2014, by more than 20 gunshots fired by a group of people who acted with impunity. A few weeks after the murder, two of the people who attacked compañero Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano were detained by compañeros from the community and handed over to the ministerial authorities, now these two people are undergoing criminal proceedings in El Amate, their names are: Sebastián Méndez Hernández (an officer of the municipal police in Chilón at the time of the murder) and Jerónimo Hernández Gómez.
The organization has a well-founded fear that this attack on the three compañeros may be in retaliation for the arrest of the municipal police officer Sebastián Méndez Hernández who took part in the murder of our compañero Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano.
We hold all three levels of government responsible for anything bad that happens to our compañeros JUAN ANTONIO GOMEZ SILVANO, MARIO AGUILAR SILVANO and ROBERTO GOMEZ HERNANDEZ, from the community of Virgen de Dolores, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle.
We ask you to support us by disseminating this information, and send combative greetings.
Land and Freedom
***
Land and Resistance in Virgen de Dolores, ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle of the EZLN
To understand a little more about what is happening in Virgen de Dolores, ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, municipality of Chilón, Chiapas, video-documentary “Land and Resistance in San Sebastián Bachajón”
Land and Freedom!!
***********************************************************************************
La Sexta Bachajón carries out a road block in defence of their territory and autonomy
Monday, 15 September. Adherents to the Sixth from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón organized a road block on the road from Ocosingo to Palenque at the high point of the turning to Agua Azul, to express their rejection of the tourism megaprojects planned by the government, which include the construction of a motorway which is planned to cross the territory of the ejido. (More information on this)
Through this action, they also seek to demand justice for the murder of two of their compañeros, Juan Vazquez Guzman and Juan Carlos Gomez Silvano, and the freedom of their compañeros who are prisoners, Santiago Moreno Pérez and Emilio Jiménez Gómez held in the prison at Playas de Catazajá and Esteban Gómez Jiménez, imprisoned in El Amate.
***
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 15 SEPTEMBER, 2014
.
.
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras, today we are going to block the road from Palenque to Ocosingo at the high point of the turning to Agua Azul, to express our strong opposition to the dispossession of our territory, we will not allow the government to take away our mother earth for their projects of death which are for the benefit of the capitalists and not for the benefit of our people.
We demand that the government-supporting ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez stops betraying the people by handing over the lands of our people to the bad government for tourism projects and the construction of the highway from san cristobal de las casas to palenque, we will not allow him to continue giving away the lands we inherited from our grandfathers and grandmothers.
This mobilization we are carrying out is to remember that our murdered compañeros Juan Vázquez Guzmán (24 April 2014) and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano (March 21, 2014) gave their lives in defence of the Mother Earth and defended their people from the ambition and corruption of the bad governors. We also demand the freedom of our unjustly imprisoned tseltal compañeros Santiago Moreno Pérez (2009) and Emilio Jiménez Gómez (2014) in the prison at Playas de Catazajá and compañero Esteban Gómez Jiménez (2013) a prisoner in El Amate.
From the northern zone of the state of Chiapas we send a combative embrace to all the struggles and resistances in Mexico and the world. Never again a Mexico without us.
Attentively
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
***********************************************************************************
Indigenous From Chilón Municipality, Chiapas, Reject Road Construction
.
.
By Elio Henríquez, correspondent
Mon, 11 Aug 2014 13:01
San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas. Residents of the ejidos San Sebastián Bachajón and San Jerónimo Bachajón, in Chilón municipality, and of the community of Tierra y Libertad, belonging to Yajalón, expressed their opposition to the construction of the highway which will link this city with Palenque.
“We express our total rejection of the construction of the highway, because it will bring great problems to our lands which we inherited from our parents and grandparents, and which we have achieved through much hard work and years of struggle,” they said in a public letter.
They added that “the interests of the three levels of government and national and foreign companies want to destroy our cultivated land plots, springs of water, mountains, homes, lands for harvesting, sacred places, medicinal plants and above all our own culture, by imposing, without informing us and hearing our words, their great projects like the construction of the highway, hydroelectric dams, exploitation of mines, and various programmes” of the governments.
They pointed out that according to the information they have, “the federal government has granted licence and permission to foreign companies for the construction of the San Cristobal-Palenque highway, which will affect seven municipalities in the state of Chiapas: Huixtán, Tenejapa, Oxchuc, Ocosingo, Chilón, Palenque, and Salto de Agua, where we, women and men, indigenous Tzotzil, Tzeltal and Chol, are living.”
Against “this violent dispossession (invasion) which the three levels of government and foreign companies are carrying out in complicity with the ejido authorities, we, the women and men of the ejidos San Sebastián Bachajón, San Jerónimo Bachajón, and Tierra y Libertad, those who live in this land where we work sowing and cultivating our food to sustain family life, express our total rejection of the construction” of the road, which, according to official information, has already cost about 10 billion dollars, and the work would not begin until later this year.
They said that the government “violates our human rights, although it has signed and ratified the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Convention 169 of the International Labour Organization and the International Agreement on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights” among other international treaties obliging the State to monitor, observe and protect the basic rights of indigenous peoples and communities.
Therefore, they demanded that the authorities of the three levels “hear our requests and demands, for, should they fail to take into account what the people say, we will hold marches, roadblocks, and all that is necessary to defend our Mother Earth and the future of our children.”
********************************************************************
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 3rd AUGUST, 2014
–
–
To the Clandestine Indigenous Revolutionary Committee, General Command of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico
Compañeras and compañeros of the General Command of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation and of the EZLN support bases, we thank you for the invitation to the exchange in Caracol 1, La Realidad, where the compañero and teacher Galeano gave his life for the mother earth, killed by groups of political party supporters on May 2, 2014, like our compañeros Juan Vázquez Guzmán who fell on April 24, 2013 and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano on March 21, 2014.
We see with rage how the bad government is shamelessly changing the Mexican constitution and laws to dispossess us of our territories and exploit our natural resources as they wish, their strategy is to displace us in any way they can, it is a policy of genocide to make a lot of money for a few people.
Enrique Pena Nieto and Manuel Velasco Coello, the deputies and senators, are puppets, they only serve their masters who are money and transnationals, for this reason they put in prison our compañeras and compañeros who get in the way of their business, or murder them to sow fear in our people.
Those from above always say that we in resistance are a minority and that we do not want progress and development for the communities, they are cynical liars who deceive people with their crumbs and false promises, taking advantage of the need and lack of information in which our communities live. What they, those from above, call progress and development, we from below call dispossession and death, poverty, marginalization, discrimination, because they, the politicians and corrupt murderers and businesspeople, buy and sell territories along with everything and the people who live in those places, without consulting or asking the opinion of our peoples. When the people and communities let us know that our lands were rented or purchased by a company to exploit for more than 40 or 50 years, the government comes with the police, according to them so as to ensure order and the rule of law, just another lie from those from above, which we call exploitation, abuse of power and betrayal of the people.
The treacherous Mexican political class certainly feels tranquil about the great betrayal and dispossession which it has made to the peoples of Mexico, because it has lots of money, property and guaranteed work in the companies it is selling them to, or it even goes to another country to hide and protect itself with police in its large houses so as to not face the people, but it is also true that, like cynical liars, there remain congressmen, senators, governors and the president of the republic to continue robbing the people.
The only thing that keeps these corrupt politicians in power is the police, the army, repression, because they do not have the support of the people. It is like in San Sebastian Bachajón the last ejidal commissioners were imposed by the government to do as they please, and the same government gives them the power to order the murder of our compañeros social activists and to sell the lands of our people, but these commissioners do not have a majority, they only have the government as masters.
This is why our organization of the people of San Sebastian Bachajón will continue fighting to defend the territory we inherited from grandparents, we want to walk with the people who love their land and defend it to make our struggle larger, and to tell the bad government that the organized people are in command, and the government must obey, respect the peoples, enough of so much discrimination and violence against our people.
From the northern zone of Chiapas, we greet the compañeras and compañeros of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation and all the peoples in resistance who will be present at the exchange with the Indigenous National Congress in La Realidad, to listen to each other and build a path of justice and freedom.
NEVER AGAIN A MEXICO WITHOUT US!!!
Attentively
Land and Freedom! Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
*************************************************************
Ejidos San Sebastian and San Jerónimo Bachajón and Tierra y libertad reject highway construction.
July 31, 2014
To the people of Mexico and the world
To the national and international press
To national and international civil society
To human rights organizations
To adherents to the Other Campaign
To social organizations
To the alternative media
By this means, the indigenous women and men and organised campesinos from different communities of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, San Jerónimo Bachajón, Tierra y libertad make public our word, our denouncement and our demands to the three levels of Federal, State and Municipal Government.
We know that the federal government has granted licence and permission to foreign companies for the construction of the San Cristobal-Palenque highway which will affect seven municipalities in the state of Chiapas: Huixtán, Tenejapa, Oxchuc, Ocosingo, Chilón, Palenque, and Salto de Agua, where we, women and men, indigenous Tzotzil, Tzeltal and Chol, are living.
Against this violent dispossession (invasion) which the three levels of government and foreign companies are carrying out in complicity with the ejido authorities, we, the women and men of the ejidos San Sebastián Bachajón, San Jerónimo Bachajón, Tierra y libertad, those who live in this land where we work sowing and cultivating our food to sustain family life,
We denounce:
Our total rejection of the construction of the highway since it will bring great problems for our lands which we inherited from our parents and grandparents, which we have achieved with much hard work and struggle, but now for their own interests the governments and national and foreign companies want to destroy our cultivated land plots, springs of water, mountains, homes, meadows, sacred places, medicinal plants and above all our own culture, imposing, without informing us and hearing our words, their great projects like the construction of the highway, hydroelectric dams, mineral extraction, imposition of the Fanar programme, as well as investigations which SAGARPA and CONAFOR seek to carry out in our lands, and the construction of tourist centres,
all of this for the benefit of governments and large corporations who, with programmes and projects, divide communities buying the conscience of the people through trickery and promises like telling us that we will come out of poverty, but none of this is true, on the contrary we increasingly resent the impacts of the economic crisis and climate change which are affecting so much our corn, beans, coffee and other crops with the presence of pests which destroy our plantings.
So we say to the government:
- We do not want government projects like fanar, PROCAMPO, monoculture, the national crusade against hunger, oportunidades and the housing programme
- We totally reject the investigations in our lands by SAGARPA CONAFOR and AMAREF
- No to the construction of the San Cristobal-Palenque highway, hydroelectric dams, mineral exploitation in our lands and territories
- We totally reject the forms of dispossession of our land and natural resources by the government with its FANAR project, because the land is inherited from our grandparents, so we will fight to defend it
- No to the displacement and to the relocation of our families, neither by the force of the army nor by the tricks of programmes and projects
- We do not want ecotourism resorts or hotel areas in our lands
- We totally reject all the structural reforms
- We reject the imposition of other interests which do not respect our view of the world, our identity, our way of life, our culture
The government is violating our human rights, which it has signed and ratified in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (art. 25); Convention 169 of the International Labour Organization (art. 7); Convention of Belem second paragraph (art. 5); International Agreement on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (Article 11); the Constitution of the United Mexican States (art 1, 2, 4, 133), and the Constitution of the Free and Sovereign State of Chiapas (art. 3).
WE DEMAND
- That the government hears our requests and demands. Should they fail to take into account what the people say, we will hold marches, roadblocks, and all that is necessary to defend our Mother Earth and the future of our children
- The respect, use and enjoyment of our land
- Respect for ILO Convention 169, that as indigenous peoples we have a right to the land, to our culture and to decide about the natural resources which are in our territory. Neither the government nor other countries and nations have the right to invade and dispossess us from our lands
- Respect for the right to our land and our ways of living and thinking, for this is where we eat, here are our roots left by our ancestors
- We are not going to keep quiet, nor be deceived by their programmes and projects, nor will we allow them to divide us as indigenous peoples
- The land is not for sale because it is not a commodity, because it is where we eat, work, and grow our food
- That they guarantee the right to life of the indigenous and non-indigenous peoples who are threatened by these neoliberal projects
We call on the women, men and ejidal authorities of the different communities and ejidos to join our fight for the defence of the land and territory against the construction of highway, hydroelectric and mining projects. We call on the peoples of Chiapas and Mexico to organize ourselves, as women and men, and on ejidal and religious authorities to recognize our rights to fight against the bad government which exploits and oppresses us.
******************************************************************************
Attempt to dispossess ejido owner in San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, is denounced
* They impute false crimes to him so as not to return his land to him, on which they have already constructed latrines, the Tzeltales say
By: Hermann Bellinghausen, Envoy
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, July 15, 2014
Ejido owners of San Sebastián Bachajón, Chilón municipality, denounced that the officialist (pro-government) authorities seek to dispossess an autonomous ejido owner of his rights through false accusations and with backing from the state delegates.
“The people from the government make us divide in the communities, making us fight, killing each other among the same compañeros, among brothers,” maintain the indigenous. In the last year they have murdered two important leaders, in real executions by gunmen.
The Tzeltal ejido owners, adherents of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, point to the president of the ejido commission, Manuel Jiménez Gómez, and other authorities (Pedro Jiménez Gómez, Mariano Espinoza Guzmán, Manuel Gutiérrez Guzmán and Manuel Hernández Moreno, alias Dios Negro), who on June 12, 13, and 14 promoted a general assembly of the three centres that make up the ejido and all of its population centers: Jet Ja, Guadalupe Paxila and Centro Bachajón. The authorities proposed that the assembly deprive Jerónimo Gómez Méndez, a native of the Jol Tanchibil Yoc Campo ranchería, of his ejido right.
“They are dispossessing the compañero of his land where they have already constructed seven latrines promoted by the federal, state and municipal governments. As an organization we ask for the suspension of the work, making it known through an official writing to the municipal president, the delegate of government and public works (sic) so that they take notice of the issue.” Upon not seeing an answer, the autonomous authorities issued a notice to appear “three times” to the engineering contractor, who “paid no attention.”
The manoeuvre of the officialists to dispossess the ejido owner from Jol Tanchibil is based on false accusations, but they intend that the assembly agrees “to cancel his agrarian right without having done the investigations, because according to authorities, our compañero is not fulfilling the requisites of being an ejido owner and has not paid the property tax for 20 years, and (they are) prefabricating the crime of shooting at a school in that very same community.”
In the first place, they specify, the accused is complying with the requisites and paying property taxes.”
The ejido owners of the Sixth have been struggling for seven years against “the bad government’s dispossessions, like its San Cristóbal-Palenque Super-Highway projects, which affects its territory and doesn’t benefit society.”
Faced with the dispossession of their compañero, “the village made agreements to work collectively, to clean the pasture and take out six of the latrines.” Upon finishing that work, they say, they were attacked from a distance of approximately 500 metres by seven individuals “with firearms and carrying machetes, shooting into the air at the side of the Pablo Galeana bilingual primary school.”
They identified the aggressors as Domingo Gómez Méndez (first and second), Mario Méndez Gutiérrez, as well as Miguel, Anselmo, Nicolás and Armando, all with the surname Gómez Gutiérrez. “The same day Manuel Moreno Jiménez, a lawyer with professional permit 5631499, and a native of Sacun Cubwitz, Chilón, currently located in Yajalón, came to head the fabrication of the crime (against Jernónimo Gómez Méndez)” the denouncers add.
“The lawyer put together a false document, fabricating a crime against our compañero,” accusing him with the others attacked “of being the ones that shot (at the school).”
———————————————-
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Wednesday, July 16, 2014
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2014/07/16/politica/019n1
English translation by the Chiapas Support Committee for the International Zapatista Translation Service
***************************************************************************
Ejido San Jerónimo Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaraton of the Lacandon Jungle, Chiapas, Mexico, on the 14th of July, 2014.
To public opinion,
To the national and international media,
To defenders of human rights,
To non-governmental organizations,
To the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle,
To the friends of the Indigenous National Congress
To the Sixth commission of the EZLN
To the Good Government Councils
To the different peoples and organizations that struggle for justice and dignity.
We send greetings to all our friends from the different organizations that follow the Sixth Declaration of the EZLN and to the different peoples that struggle; we send you an embrace from the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle from the ejido San Jerónimo, Bachajón, Chiapas, Mexico, the World. Just like you are struggling for autonomy, justice and dignity, for seven years we have been struggling against the pillage of the bad government, such as its projects for a superhighway between San Cristobal and Palenque, which will affect our ejido and will not benefit society.
As such we publicly denounce the Commission President, Manuel Jiménez Gómez, the Security Council Pedro Jiménez Gutiérrez, Secretary, Mariano Espinoza Guzmán, Treasurer, Manuel Gutiérrez, and the Secretary to the Security Council, Manuel Hernandez Moreno (Alias “Dios Negro”), who on the 12th, 13th, and 14th of June of this year held a general assembly of the three centres of Jet Ja, Guadalupe Paxila and Bachajón Centre, in which one of the items for discussion attempted to convince the ejido members to deprive our compañero Jerónimo Gómez Mendez, from the Jol Tanchibil Yoc Campo ranch, in the Chilón Municipality, Chiapas, of his ejidal rights, and in which it was agreed to cancel his agrarian rights without investigations being carried out. The authorities allege that our compañero is not honouring the requirements for an ejido member, and has not paid local taxes for 20 years; and they have fabricated the crime of a school shooting in the aforementioned community. In reality, he is honouring the requirements for ejido members, and is paying local taxes. They are taking the compañero’s land, on which were constructed seven latrines, sponsored by the federal, state and municipal government. As an organization we requested the suspension of these works, doing so with their full knowledge, taking a letter about the matter to the municipal presidency, the government representative, and [a government body for] public works. Upon not receiving a reply, we arranged to see the engineer contractor three times. They did not pay attention to the autonomous authorities because the people from the Government want to divide us one from another in the communities, make us fight each other, kill each other, among compañeros , among indigenous people, among brothers. For this reason, the village agreed to work collectively to clear out the prairie and to remove six latrines. When the job ended, we returned, approximately 500 metres, seven people attacked with firearms and machetes, shooting freely into the air by the Bilingual Primary School “Pablo Galeana”. Their names are Domingo Gómez Mendez 1st, Mario Mendez Gutiérrez, Miguel Gómez Gutiérrez, Anselmo Gómez Gutierrez, Nícolas Gómez Gutiérrez. Armando Gómez Gutiérrez, and Domingo Gómez Mendez 2nd. That same day, Manuel Moreno Jiménez, with his professional document number 5631499, from the community of Sacun Cubwitz, Chilón municipality, Chiapas, currently residing in Yajalón, Chiapas, arrived in person to hand a fabricated document blaming this crime on our friend Jerónimo Gómez Mendez, accusing him of using the firearm. For this reason, we ask the competent authorities not to violate individual guarantees nor our human rights as indigenous people.
Attentively,
Justice, Land and Liberty,
Adherents to the Sixth Declaration,
Of the ejido San Jerónimo Bachajón,
Zapata lives! The struggle continues!
*****************************************************************************
Bachajón: the Mexican justice system gets the chance to stop rights abuses
Members of this Tseltal ejido continue the legal fight for their lands, in the face of three years of repression and tricks
By Ricardo Lagunes Gasca
A life in struggle
–
Chiapas, Mexico. Three years after the legal defence of the lands of the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido [communally owned territory] began, the Third Collegiate Court will have the opportunity to address the root of the problem and issue a ruling on the alleged violations of indigenous rights.
The life of the indigenous peoples and communities in Mexico is increasingly threatened with extinction, in the face of “structural” constitutional and legislative reforms that result in the illegal appropriation of their natural resources, either by privatization or through forcible seizure.
Against this background various indigenous communities have begun legal actions to defend their rights. These include the Yaqui tribe, campaigning against the Independence Aqueduct, or the Ikoots people of San Dionisio del Mar, fighting to stop construction of the mega wind farm at Barra Santa Teresa, among others.
Although provisional or final court judgements are meant to offer protection for indigenous lands, they have not in fact changed any facts on the ground for these communities. As a result, the threat to the life and land of the community remains, requiring greater organisation and political mobilization to prevent abuses becoming irreversible.
The Tseltal ejidatarios at San Sebastián Bachajón are adherents to the [Zapatista] Sixth Declaration of the Selva Lacandona. They began the legal defence of their lands in March 2011, aiming to reverse the violent seizure of their lands which began on 2 February 2011 when communal lands adjoining the village of Agua Azul (Tumbalá Muncipality) which belong to the ejido were taken away, along with the ejido’s main gravel quarry.
This land grab was carried out by the Government Secretary, Noé Castañón León, working with Leonardo Rafael Guirao Aguilar (president of the Green Chiapas Foundation and currently the municipal president of Chilón), along with the ex-commissioner of the ejido, Francisco Guzmán Jiménez and government supporting groups from the Xanil and Pamalha villages in Chilón.
Since March 2011 the Zapatista supporters have faced a series of arbitrary judicial decisions that have denied them justice and an effective means of protecting their lands. Nonetheless, in spite of the racism towards indigenous people that pervades the justice system, they continue to resist and to contest the illegal judgements made by the Seventh District Judge in Tuxtla Gutierrez. They have also appealed to public opinion over the lack of ethics of certain federal judges who put themselves at the disposal of the rich and powerful.
In appeal proceedings, the Third Collegiate Court has now accepted that the Seventh District Judge violated due process on two separate occasions. These violations relate to the fact that the judge failed to inform the general assembly of the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido that a legal appeal made by Mariano Moreno Guzman (a representative of the Bachajón ejido) had in fact been granted. Now that the general assembly has been informed and has not contested the appeal, the Third Collegiate Court has the opportunity to address the underlying issue and to make a ruling on the violation of indigenous rights.
Separately, the ex-commissioner of the ejido Francisco Guzmán Jiménez and the current commissioner, Alejandro Moreno Gómez, tried to prevent a judgement being made on the appeal by fabricating proceedings of the assembly. These proceedings do not follow the requirements of the Agrarian Law in the slightest degree. They are also signed only by those two individuals and lack the signatures of other ejido members. So far this has prevented the appeal being resolved in favour of the economic and political interests that are protecting the commissioner and ex-commissioner.
The only reason the government’s placemen hold their positions in the ejido commission is because they are protected by these wider interests. The commissioners have no support in the assembly or among the wider community. They were in fact imposed with support provided by the municipal president of Chilon, and the Rural Procurator in Ocosingo to make it appear their election was legal. The Bachajón ejido members have now challenged the legality of the appointment of Alejandro Moreno Gómez and other members at the 54th District Agrarian Tribunal in Comitán.
In playing his assigned role, Alejandro Moreno Gómez is not only working with various government agencies to appropriate the ejido’s common land and gravel quarry, but is also preparing the way for the construction of the San Cristóbal de Las Casas – Palenque highway. It seems that he is ready to continue playing a role in promoting murder and impunity.
The author is a human rights lawyer
***********************************************************************
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, ADHERENT TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 10th JUNE, 2014
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international collectives and committees of solidarity
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
–
Compañeros and compañeras who are fighting for a world in which many worlds fit, we send a combative embrace and all our solidarity to the people and communities of Mexico and the world who are resisting dispossession, discrimination and the policies of death of the corrupt bad governments and the national and international companies.
We are in struggle to defend our mother earth, even though the officialist (government-supporting) ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez wants to hand it over to the bad government, the organized people will defend it whatever the cost, because the blood of our fallen compañeros Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano was shed in defence of the land, for this reason neither the ejidal commissioner nor the bad governments can take from us that which cost the lives of our compañeros, and is inherited from our grandparents.
Our organization is also continuing to defend by the legal route the land that the bad government wants to take from us, with the petition for amparo 274/2011, before the seventh district judge in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas, which has already been over three years in judgement, and this corrupt judge, who already has an agreement with the bad government, has respected neither the law nor human rights, which is why he does not want to resolve our case and only washes his hands saying that he will not proceed to study the case because we have no right to defend our land, and he falsely says that the ejidal assembly consented to the government staying permanently in our lands. Twice the Third Collegiate Court in Tuxtla Gutierrez has resolved our demands positively because the judgments of the seventh district judge are illegal; now the collegiate tribunal is going to study the proceedings for amparo for the third time.
Also, as an organization we filed a complaint before the Agrarian Tribunal in Comitán about the ejidal commissioner, for the illegal assembly in which Alejandro Moreno Gómez and his members were imposed as ejidal commissioners, many irregularities were committed, with the support of the Agrarian Prosecutor of Ocosingo. On June 5 a hearing was held in the agrarian tribunal where the ejidal commissioner alejandro moreno gómez arrived with his members and people who were intimidating and harassing the compañeros of our organization taking pictures and videos with their mobile phones.
We denounce that on June 11, 2014 the officialist ejidal commissioner is organizing an illegal assembly to illegally collect signatures to ask to withdraw the petition for amparo and land claim from before the tribunals, to simulate that the general assembly of ejidatarios are in agreement with the dispossession; so we denounce these corruptions because we energetically reject these crimes committed by the ejidal commissioner to the detriment of the people of San Sebastián Bachajón, as an authority he should respect his people, but he is a mere puppet of the bad government because he has no dignity.
From the northern zone of Chiapas we ask the compañeros and compañeras to remain vigilant about what happens, because the bad government increasingly seeks to put an end to our organization to dispossess our people of their territory.
Never again a Mexico without us
Attentively
Land and Freedom!
Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
Translated by Dorset Chiapas Solidarity
**********************************************************************
Warning that “spurious” leaders seek to dispossess ejido owners of their lands in Bachajón
** They simulate an assembly to prevent the tribunals from defending those affected
** “Neither the commissioner nor the bad governments will take the inheritance from our grandfathers from us,” they say
Hermann Bellinghausen
The ejido owners of San Sebastián Bachajón (Chilón municipality, Chiapas), adherents to the Sixth declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, denounced that this Wednesday the spurious ejido representation, headed by Alejandro Moreno Gómez, held an assembly without a majority to prevent the state tribunals from giving an answer to the demand for respecting ejido property against the dispossession, for tourist purposes, of a part of the Tzeltal community’s territory. This occurred within the lawsuit for amparo (protective order) 274/2011, which the judge on the case has arbitrarily and unjustifiably delayed.
The mentioned illegal assembly that the officialist commission convoked with his allied group was not “public and open nor with all of the assembly, and it did not comply with the time frames that Agrarian Law imposes,” the indigenous reported.
They noted that they do not recognize what was said and agreed to there, with respect to the protective order against dispossession and the agrarian demand that opposes the naming of Moreno Gómez.
The “illegal assembly was closed door, not in the customary place, which is the ejido house, and only a reduced group of ejido owners and non- ejido owners participated, whom which it is sought to simulate the making of decisions.”
The ejido owners of the Sixth asserted: “We are in struggle to defend our Mother Earth, although the officialist (pro government) ejidal commissioner wants to hand it over to the bad government. The organized people are going to defend it whatever the cost, because the blood of our fallen compañeros Juan Vázquez Guzmán (murdered one year ago) and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano (murdered two months ago) was spilled in defence of the land. Neither the ejido commission nor the bad governments can take away from us what has cost the life of our compañeros and is inherited from our grandfathers and grandmothers.”
They warned: “Our organization continues legally defending the land that the bad government wants to dispossess from us” with the lawsuit for a protective order 274/2011 before the seventh district judge in Tuxtla Gutiérrez. The case has gone on for more than three years and the “corrupt judge” who has the case “already has an agreement with the bad government. He has not respected the law or human rights, and he does not want to resolve it and washes his hands saying that he does not proceed to study the case because we do not have the right to defend our land and falsely says that the assembly gave its consent to the permanent stay of the government on our lands.”
On two occasions the third collegiate tribunal in Tuxtla Gutiérrez has positively resolved the ejido owners demands. “The decisions of the seventh district judge are illegal,” they added. Now the collegiate tribunal is going to study the protective order record for the third time.
They also filed a complaint against the commission before the Agrarian Tribunal in Comitán for the illegal assembly in which Moreno Gómez and his followers were imposed as ejido commissioners. “They committed many irregularities with the support of the Agrarian Prosecutor of Ocosingo.” The hearing was just held on June 5 in the agrarian tribunal, where Moreno Gómez arrived with his people “and individuals who were intimidating and harassing the compañeros from our organization, taking photos and videos.”
With the manoeuver of the illegal meeting it is sought to “simulate that the general assembly of ejido owners is in agreement with the dispossession. We denounce these corruptions and energetically reject the crimes that the ejido commissioner commits against the people of San Sebastián Bachajón. As an authority he ought to respect his people, but he is just a puppet of the bad government, because he has no Dignity.”
—————————————————————-
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Thursday, June 12, 2014
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2014/06/12/politica/012n1pol
**************************************************************************
Communique from the women of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón
April 19, 2014
Sisters and brothers, from the northern zone of Chiapas receive a warm greeting from the women of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, Adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle.
As women who accompany the journey of our people in the construction of autonomy and the defence of our territory against dispossession, we want to give our humble word for these worldwide days to demand justice for our people and to tell you they that we thank you very much for following our struggle; your support encourages us to continue resisting the policies of death and contempt of the bad government.
Our people have suffered repression and death as a result of the struggle we started in 2007 against the imposition of tourist projects which seek to take over our land to give it to businessmen. On the 24th of April, a year after the assassination of our brother Juan Vazquez Guzman, a compañero who was always at the side of our people, defending our mother earth with strength and courage; they did the same to our compañero Juan Carlos Gomez Silvano, whose life was taken from him in a cowardly manner on the 21st March of this year. With these killings the government thought it could stop our struggle, but it was wrong, the life and the path of our brothers lives on in our hearts and gives us the strength to continue to defend our mother earth.
We as women and compañeras fight for justice for our people, so that our mother earth is not handed over like a commodity, and the killings of our brothers do not go unpunished.
We thank all the compañeras from different organizations, collectives and groups who have heard our word, and have understood and supported our struggle, and we thank all the compañeros who recognize us as sisters in struggle.
Land and Freedom
Juan Vazquez Guzman Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Garlos Gomez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Long live the women who resist!
*****************************************************************************
From the US: The Black Student Alliance Supports San Sebastian Bachajón
On Sunday, May 11, the Black Student Alliance screened the new video on the struggle of the Tzeltal Indians of San Sebastián Bachajón. More than 100 students, including members of the Chicano/Chicana Student Movement of Aztlan (Mecha) attended and learned about this dignified struggle against dispossession. After watching the video a communique was read from the women in struggle from San Sebastian Bachajón.
As students of the black race, we understand what it is to be oppressed by the racist and capitalist system. Like the indigenous race in Mexico, the black race is one of the poorest peoples in this country. As people of colour (blacks, Latinos, indigenous and Asians) we face racism every day in our daily lives. But as a community in struggle, we organize to fight against all forms of oppression. The mighty struggle of Bachajón fills us with motivation to keep fighting here. We see the people of Bachajón as a great example of brave fighters and we are filled with energy.
We want you to know that from here we offer you our support and we will continue to inform ourselves about your struggle. Our hope is to keep learning because we know that there is much to learn from you. At our next meeting we have agreed to watch another video on Bachajón. In addition, we will read the Sixth Declaration to learn also from that.
With all our hearts, we wish you well in your struggle.
*****************************************************************************
Government insists on the dispossession of the waterfalls of Agua Azul
In a communiqué, the indigenous people of San Sebastián Bachajón denounced the “bad justice and corruption of the government, because it does not protect the territories of indigenous peoples”; it warned that “the people will have the last word.”
COLECTIVO POZOL
Chiapas, Mexico. May 8. “The authorities intend to take the land from the campesinos to give to the government and big business”, warned the inhabitants of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, after the Seventh District Judge from Tuxtla Gutierrez again declared invalid the amparo 274/2011 promoted by the ejidatarios to prevent the dispossession of their lands, within which are situated the tourist attraction of the waterfalls of Agua Azul.
In a communiqué, the indigenous Tzeltales denounced the “bad justice and corruption of the government, because it does not protect the territories of indigenous peoples”; it warned that “the people will have the last word,” and will not allow the government to “take away the heritage of their grandparents.”
The campesinos from the municipality of Chilón, in resistance since 2007, gave their thanks for the demonstrations of solidarity through the days of global action which started on 24 April, organized by the Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York and the Committees of the true word from around the world. “We want to thank all the compañeros and compañeras of Mexico and the world who showed solidarity, who sent your messages and who are following the actions of our people,” they said.
The indigenous adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle also condemned the assassination of the Zapatista militant Galeano, in the Zapatista community of La Realidad, and asserted that “this is the way that the bad government wants to put an end to the autonomy of the peoples and the organizations who resist capitalism.”
The ejidatarios from San Sebastian Bachajón recalled that in the same way Juan Vázquez Guzmán was murdered on 24 April 2013 and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano on March 21, 2014, to put an end to “their peaceful struggle which is for land and freedom for the people.”
http://desinformemonos.org/2014/05/insiste-el-gobierno-en-el-despojo-de-las-cascadas-de-agua-azul/
***************************************************************************
United Kingdom demands justice for Bachajón
An open letter from groups from all over the United Kingdom was delivered this week to the Mexican Embassy in London, as part of a worldwide campaign of action in support of the indigenous Tzeltal community of San Sebastián Bachajón in the state of Chiapas, South-East Mexico. The ejidatarios (common landholders) here are engaged in a heroic struggle against the federal, state and municipal governments and the corporations which they serve. Their struggle is against dispossession and displacement from their ancestrally-held communally-worked lands, and it is also in defence of their way of life, their customs and traditions, and their right “to be who we are.”
As a direct result of their determination to resist giving up their lands, which they see as their mother earth, and which represent life, hope, dignity and survival, their beloved community leader and spokesperson Juan Vázquez Guzmán was savagely assassinated with high velocity firearms a year ago. It is in his memory and honour that the two weeks have been celebrated from India to Canada. In another useless attempt to put an end to the struggle of the people of San Sebastián Bachajón, another community organiser Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano was also murdered with over 20 gunshots in March of this year.
Both these killings have taken place with complete impunity, and in their letter members of the UK Zapatista Solidarity Network express their outrage at these cruel deaths, reaffirm their total support and solidarity with the common landholders of San Sebastián Bachajón in their struggle, and pay tribute to the two assassinated activists. The Network denounces the growing climate of violence, dispossession and impunity throughout Mexico, directed at indigenous peoples, defenders of the land and territory, fighters for social justice, human rights advocates, journalists and all those in resistance to the forces of neoliberal domination. The letter calls for a return to ethical principles and to justice. Furthermore, it questions the lack of accountability of those who seek to promote and accumulate individual wealth through dispossession.
[At the same time the UK Zapatista solidarity Network denounced another, even more recent, assassination, that of compañero Galeano, a Zapatista support base from La Realidad, Chiapas, who was brutally murdered in a premeditated paramilitary attack.]
Here is the letter:
Lic. Enrique Peña Nieto, President of the Mexican Republic
Lic. Manuel Velasco Coello, Governor of the State of Chiapas
Lic. Leonardo Rafael Guirao Aguilar, Municipal President of Chilón, Chiapas
Sr Alejandro Ives Estivill Castro, Mexican Ambassador to the UK
Embassy of Mexico
16 St George Street
London
W1S 1FD
Dear Sirs
Re: Ethics, impunity and dispossession in the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, municipality of Chilón, Chiapas, and in Mexico as a whole
We the undersigned, gathered together at the national meeting of the UK Zapatista Solidarity Network, on 27th April 2014, have agreed to write to express our profound concerns at the alarming increase in physical and structural violence, with the intention of dispossession, currently being committed in Mexico with complete impunity and in complete disregard of national and international law and of ethical standards.
Our specific concern centres on the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, where the people of the community are enduring repeated violence, harassment, assassination, imprisonment, torture and intimidation as a result of their struggle to defend their ancestrally owned common lands, but we feel the issues highlighted in the case of this ejido can also be seen throughout Mexico.
The indigenous Tzeltal people of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón are faced with dispossession and displacement so that an exclusive elite tourism development can be constructed in their territory. Two of their most active community leaders and representatives have recently been assassinated with high calibre firearms: Juan Vázquez Guzmán on April 24, 2013, and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano on March 21, 2014,. No one has been charged with material or intellectual responsibility for their tragic killings, there has been no punishment and no justice.
We believe that these political murders also reflect an institutional racism against indigenous peoples, expressed through marginalisation, discrimination and persecution. Since 2007, around 150 Tzeltal inhabitants of Bachajón have been imprisoned. This is part of a wider pattern where indigenous people, without resources, and often unable to read, write or understand Spanish, are charged with crimes they have not committed, denied access to a lawyer or representative who speaks their language, tortured into confessing, often unknowingly, to acts of which they are innocent, and imprisoned for long periods.
The ejido San Sebastián Bachajón is one of many indigenous communities in Mexico which is struggling against the dispossession of its lands to make way for megaprojects promoted by the three levels of government and the big businesses they serve. The ethical and legal rights of the communities to their land are both ignored. It seems that there is here a culture of impunity, and that people throughout Mexico who defend the mother earth can be cut down and their killers will not be identified or punished. The ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón say “the government uses public forces, such as the state preventive police, the army and the federal police to terrorize communities and so imposes terror to achieve its goals.”
We believe we again see here a much larger pattern, one of the criminalisation, intimidation and elimination of protest. The killings of journalists, human rights defenders and activists defending the land are increasing. It seems to be part of a message being sent by the powerful to threaten and terrorise those who take part in social movements or mobilisations of dissent. This can also been seen, for example, in regions such as San Salvador Atenco and many communities in the state of Oaxaca.
It is clear that the culture of impunity also extends to the multinational banks and corporations which can plunder the lands, extract the heart of the earth, uproot the trees, poison the earth and the water, steal the rivers and displace the original populations, thereby causing death, sickness and devastation, all with complete impunity. It seems that money can buy anything, whatever the cost to the original inhabitants of these lands.
We see that the state is seeking, through repression, murder and impunity, to establish the dispossession and privatization of indigenous territories in order to ensure that the land is handed over for the implementation of large-scale projects, designed by international private corporations or organizations, and that this is an integral part of the strategy of dispossession of the indigenous peoples. We see that this is what is happening to the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, and it is in support of their rights that we address our concerns to you.
We insist that it is essential and fundamental to guarantee the safety and security of those who seek to defend the communally held lands of indigenous peoples against plunder and dispossession.
We offer our total support to the community of San Sebastián Bachajón in their continuing struggle. We raise our voices to demand justice and call for an end to impunity. We demand respect for the rights of the indigenous Tzeltal peoples of San Sebastián Bachajón, as established under ILO Convention 169 concerning Indigenous and Tribal Peoples and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, both of which have been signed by the Mexican government. And we insist that their ethical and moral rights to justice, freedom and a dignified life are also respected.
We therefore make the following demands:
- A full and fair investigation into the material and intellectual authors of the assassinations of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, and punishment of those responsible
- Respect for the fundamental human rights of the indigenous Tzeltal peoples of San Sebastián Bachajón, and guarantees for their security and integrity
- Respect and guarantees for their right to the full use and enjoyment of their territory and to self-determination and the construction of their autonomy
- An end to the plunder and dispossession, the theft of commons, the militarisation of the area, and to the threats and violence being experienced
- A fair, impartial and objective resolution of amparo 274/2011
We will continue to monitor closely any developments in the area of San Sebastián Bachajón, and we will hold you, the three levels of government, responsible for any violence, attacks, killings or acts of harassment and intimidation that may occur, to the ejidatarios adherents to the Sixth Declaration, or to their legal representatives and supporters.
It is both illegal and immoral to terrorise a people in to giving up its lands. Money cannot buy absolution. Impunity is not justice.
Respectfully
UK Zapatista Solidarity Network:
-Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group
-Edinburgh Chiapas Solidarity Group
-Kiptik (Bristol)
-London Mexico Solidarity Group
-Manchester Zapatista Collective
-UK Education, Culture and Communication team
-UK Zapatista Translation Service
-Zapatista Solidarity Group – Essex
-Individual members of the network
**********************************************************************
From Montreal, Canada: The Circle of Indigenous Nations in Solidarity with San Sebastián Bachajón
On Thursday the first of May in the city of Montreal, The Circle of Indigenous Nations of the University of Québec in Montréal: “Circle of First Nations of UQAM”, held its monthly cultural evening. In this event the video “Bachajón, Dispossession is death, Life is resistance” was screened as part of the two weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vazquez Guzman Lives, the Bachajón Struggle Continues! This video shows the struggle of the indigenous people of Bachajón in Mexico; and thus not to forget the murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, or that of Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano.
Those present were outraged at the treatment given by the Mexican government to the indigenous people of Bachajón. It was emphasized that in Canada, although the climate of violence is less, the Canadian government does not respect the rights of indigenous peoples either. At the same time the organizers voiced their solidarity with the two weeks of worldwide action and with the Sixth Declaration.
Respect for the rights of our brothers in Mexico!
*********************************************************************
From Springfield, Massachusetts, US: Support for San Sebastián Bachajón
On May 6, 2014, The Springfield No One Leaves/Nadie Se Mude Bank Tenant Association showed the most recent video from the ejidatorios (communal landholders) of San Sebastian Bachajón. After the screening there was discussion about the common struggle to fight corporate greed and displacement. Members of the Springfield No One Leaves Bank Tenant Association felt a lot of solidarity to the struggle of the people of San Sebastian Bachajón. They send this message of solidarity to the people of San Sebastian Bachajón.
Message of Solidarity
The Springfield No One Leaves/Nadie Se Mude Bank Tenants Association stands in solidarity with the people of San Sebastián Bachajón. We stand by them in their struggle for indigenous autonomy and self-determination, and their right to their ancestral land. We send our condolences to the friends and family of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and all those who have sacrificed themselves in the struggle for justice against a government in service of corporate profits. We demand an end to the criminalization of resistance and an end to the use of violence by the state, which has unjustly robbed the people of San Sebastián Bachajón. We find your fight for land in San Sebastián Bachajón important to our struggle to keep our homes in Springfield, MA. Keep fighting, we are with you in spirit and hearts.
In Solidarity,
Springfield No One Leaves/Nadie Se Mude Bank Tenant Association
******************************************************************************
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, ADHERENT TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 8th MAY, 2014
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international collectives and committees of solidarity
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras, we denounce with profound rage the paramilitaries of the bad government who assassinated the Zapatista compañero Galeano in the community of La Realidad, Chiapas, because this is the way that the bad government wants to put an end to the autonomy of the peoples and the organizations who resist capitalism.
So it was that they killed our compañeros Juan Vázquez Guzmán on April 24, 2013 and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano on March 21, 2014, to finish with our peaceful struggle which is for land and freedom for the people.
Today marks the end of the days of worldwide action that began on April 24, organized by Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York and the committees of the true word from various parts of the world, for this reason we want to thank all the compañeros and compañeras of Mexico and the world who showed solidarity, who sent your messages and who are following the actions of our people; we also send our thanks to the free media who took our word to places where we could not have taken it without your cooperation and solidarity.
We want to say that you keep struggling from your geographies in the ways you can, our people also continue struggling until the last breath of life because the dispossession does not stop, the bad government does not rest, and uses the resources and the ejidal authorities as puppets to achieve their goal to privatize our land to do business, and to put an end to our people and culture.
We inform you that on 2 May, the Seventh District Judge in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas, who has in his hands the amparo 274/2011, which our organization launched against the dispossession of the bad government, said again that our amparo is not valid on the pretext that the presence of government in our land does not affect the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, that there is no dispossession because the officialist commissioner, Alejandro Moreno Gomez, is in agreement with the presence of the government.
We denounce this corruption and bad justice which is done by the government, because it does not protect the territories of the indigenous peoples, because it is easier to take away the land from the campesinos to give it to the government and big business.
But the people have the last word and we will not allow the government to take the legacy of our grandparents, we are willing to give our lives for our mother earth, because the lives of our fallen compañeros Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano have not been in vain, they gave their lives for their people.
Compañeros and compañeras and peoples of Mexico and the world who resist the dispossession and death of the capitalist system, from the northern zone of the state of Chiapas, Mexico, we send you an embrace and combative greeting from the men and women of San Sebastián Bachajón.
Never again a Mexico without us
Attentively
Land and Freedom!
Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No dispossession of indigenous territories!
******************************************************************************
From Madrid we joined the Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
– We sent a videotaped greeting for the compas: https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com/videos/
– On the 5th May we published an article in the online edition of the newspaper Diagonal which can be seen at:
PLATAFORMA DE SOLIDARIDAD CON CHIAPAS Y GUATEMALA DE MADRID
******************************************************************************
British group relaunched as a result of the Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Ten years ago, Zap Sol UK was a very active Zapatista support group, bringing together people from a wide area of the British Isles. People moved away and became active in other struggles, and the group stopped meeting. Meanwhile things in the country got much worse, and services which should be the basic right of every human being in the world – healthcare, housing, education, social security, warmth, food – were taken away from us by the greedy capitalists in their insane desire to make more and more money at the expense of those from below. In a nation once admired throughout the world for its welfare state people now freeze to death, starve, and take their own lives in despair. Our basic freedoms are taken from us daily. Now more than ever we need to unite our struggles, only together can we bring down the filthy capitalist system. So we turned once again to the Zapatistas and to the spirit of an injury to one is an injury to all.
San Sebastian Bachajon is not a Zapatista community, but an adherent to the sixth declaration of the EZLN. When we heard about the tragic and violent killings of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano we knew we must make their struggle our own and link with the campaign being organised in their honour and in defence of their people. We responded to the call to hold a screening of the video and 27 people came and learned with horror the story of repression and death being meted out to those who defend their land and territory.
Here our common lands were stolen from us in the acts of enclosure 600 years ago, and we no longer own a handful of earth. But we fight against roads, against airports, against mining, against fracking. We stretch out our hands to our comrades in San Sebastian Bachajon and offer them our support in their fight to retain the land of their great grandparents and for liberation and justice.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Zap Sol UK, 8th May 2014
*********************************************************************
In El Barrio, New York: Community Tribute in Honor of Beloved Compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán
On April 24th, members of Movement for Justice in El Barrio, humble immigrants who struggle for dignity and against neoliberal displacement, came together to reaffirm their solidarity with San Sebastián Bachajón and to honor the fallen compañeros Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano.
It was a group of majority immigrant women that night. In Movement for Justice in El Barrio, members organize block by block and door to door to defend their community and families from the attempts of greedy property owners to push them out of their community. The landlords and the bad government that helps them want to impose their culture of money by replacing the low-income immigrant community members with people with more money who will move in and line the pockets of those from above.
On this special evening, members of Movement for Justice in El Barrio focused all of their attention on San Sebastián Bachajón. They screened the recent video from the ejidatarios (communal landholders) of San Sebastián Bachajón which documented the violent, tragic death of Juan Vasquez Guzman a year ago and the recent death of Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano. Both of these men lost their lives due to the greed of the bad government and the corporations that they serve. The short video created by the community of San Sebastián Bachajón inviting people from around the world to the April 26th commemoration of the life and death of Juan Vasquez Guzman was also screened.
Many members of Movement for Justice in El Barrio then spoke passionately about the struggle of the compas in San Sebastián Bachajón and the conditions of their own lives in El Barrio as immigrants and humble people fighting to defend their homes and community, much as the ejidatarios are fighting to defend their land. A compañera spoke of the right to a dignified place to live and her comments were echoed by another compañera who said that in El Barrio they fight for dignified housing and in San Sebastián Bachajón they struggle for dignified land. Members said that the conditions that the ejidatarios face in their community are similar to those that forced the majority of immigrants in El Barrio to leave their homeland. Immigrants in El Barrio were denied the chance to remain in their native land, go to school, to prepare for and find dignified jobs, to live healthy lives with a roof over their heads and with freedom. This caused them to leave their beloved Mexico.
The spirit of struggle of their beloved compa Juan Vázquez Guzmán and San Sebastián Bachajón have been a great inspiration to the community of El Barrio. For members of Movement, Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives in their hearts. Members of Movement for Justice in El Barrio said that it’s of utmost importance to continue organizing themselves against displacement in El Barrio and supporting their sisters and brothers in struggle of San Sebastián Bachajón. One compañera voiced a shared view that poor and humble people must support each other in El Barrio and support the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón in their struggle in defense of their natural resources. Members reaffirmed their commitment to continue supporting San Sebastián Bachajón by spreading their dignified struggle far and wide and organizing solidarity activities.
Finally, one member of Movement for Justice in El Barrio, who is a woman, mother, worker and member, read the communiqué from the women of the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón. The women and men of El Barrio, who organize against displacement and eviction, said they were inspired to hear from the women of San Sebastián Bachajón who face similar problems along with “the policies of death.” And as they are motivated “to continue resisting the policies of death and contempt of the bad government,” the members of Movement for Justice in El Barrio expressed motivation by them. Members stated that they admire the courage of these women who do not back down in fear to the violence of the bad government. “With these killings the government thought it could stop our struggle, but it was wrong, the life and the path of our brothers lives on in our hearts and gives us the strength to continue to defend our mother earth.” Hearing these words, members expressed their renewed desire to carry out the struggle for dignity and against displacement in El Barrio and to support the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón in their just struggle.
“We as women and compañeras fight for justice for our people, so that our mother earth is not handed over like a commodity, and the killings of our brothers do not go unpunished.” As the women of San Sebastián Bachajón are fighting so that their land is not sold off to the highest bidder, members of Movement for Justice in El Barrio fight under the battle cry, “El Barrio is Not for Sale, It is to be Loved and Defended!” And as the memory of Juan Vasquez Guzman and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano were honored in San Sebastián Bachajón, on April 24th in El Barrio, NY they were honored as well.
–
There are more photos here: https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com/ultimas-noticias/
************************************************************************
General condemnation of the murder of the teacher Luis Solís López
**Intellectuals demand the cessation of attacks on the EZLN school
**National and international organizations join the cry of Enough!
Hermann Bellinghausen
La Jornada
Friday 9 May 2014
The English writer John Berger, the Mexican sociologist Pablo González Casanova and the leaders Hugo Blanco Galdós of Peru and Carlos González of Mexico expressed their “deepest indignation at the attacks being suffered by our compañer@s, bases of support of the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) in the caracol of La Realidad.”
Invited by the EZLN to participate, during the first week of June, in the seminar Ethics against dispossession, the intellectuals said: “Throughout the 20 years of public existence of the EZLN, we have observed that, since January 12, 1994, despite countless provocations, the Zapatistas have committed, with a deep political-ethical determination, not to permit confrontation between indigenous.”
“Now, an organization that calls itself CIOAC Historical is being used by the state and federal governments as a paramilitary arm to attack our compañer@s, trying to pretend that this is an inter-community confrontation. They did so in Acteal, they so do now. Only someone with very bad intentions could accept this interpretation.”
This has consequently, they added, led to the “murder in cold blood of compañero José Luis Solís López, teacher in the zone at the Escuelita ‘Freedom according to the Zapatistas’. One of our votans has been killed and others have been injured.”
In a brief message, they conclude, “we demand an end now, and definitively, to these attacks against what is the most established civilising project existing in Mexico and the world. A country and a world torn by violence and crime promoted by the power of money. To our votans we send a message: “All your students will be with you at your side, and will not remain unmoved in the face of these attacks. We say to the governments ‘enough!’”
In another statement, Latin American students from the Zapatista Escuelita, from Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Venezuela and Bolivia said: “we are sustained by rage and frozen by sadness.” The means and method of ambush and murder, “alongside the destruction of collective material goods such as cutting the water supply to the population, material damage to the autonomous school and Clinic, as well as damage to their work vehicles are nothing but paramilitary actions under the tactical-military strategy of counterinsurgency which continues in Chiapas.
Organizations and groups have spoken similarly, such as Ya Basta, Milan (Italy), the Central General de Trabajadores (CGT) and caracol de Zaragoza (Spanish State) as well as the Catalan groups Adhesiva Espai de Trobada i Acció, Educación para la Acción Crítica, Grupo de investigación en Derechos Humanos and Sostenibilidad y Connexió de Recursos per a l’Acció Comunitària.
In Mexico, collectives from Puebla, the Federal District and Guadalajara, the Ñathö community of San Francisco Xochicuautla and the Tlachinollan rights centre from Guerrero condemned the murder of Solís López, “compañero Galeano,” and the attacks against the Zapatista bases Romeo Jiménez López, Andulio Gómez López, Abacuc Jiménez López, Yadiel Jiménez López, Efraín, Gerardo, Ignacio, Esaú, Noé, Saúl, Elder Darinel, Héctor, Marín, Nacho and Jairo, all of them wounded during the attack which took place during the afternoon of 2nd May in the Tojolabal community of La Realidad.
Finally, the ejidatarios of the sixth from San Sebastián Bachajón denounced 
that the “paramilitaries who assassinated the Zapatista compañero Galeano (Solís López),” represent “the way that the bad government wants to put an end to the autonomy of the peoples and the organizations who resist capitalism. So it was that they killed our compañeros Juan Vázquez Guzmán on April 24, 2013 and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano on March 21, 2014, to finish off our peaceful struggle which is for land and freedom for the people.”
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2014/05/09/index.php?section=politica&article=018n1pol
*****************************************************************************
From the United Kingdom: The UK Zapatista Solidarity Network participates in the Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues! and makes plans for future organising
The UK Zapatista Solidarity Network, which unites groups, individuals and collectives from different parts of the British Isles, met recently in Bristol.
As part of their meeting, the Network responded to the call for participation in the Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues! During the meeting, the video “Bachajón – Dispossession is death, Life is resistance.” was screened. This video is being shared all over the world as part of this initiative, and 9 screenings have been organised in England alone.
The network as a whole, as well as the individual groups, has already signed the European Pronouncement in Support of the Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!which was promoted by the Edinburgh Chiapas Solidarity Group from Scotland.
The UK Network has a history of support actions for the the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, and their dignified struggle against dispossession from their lands to enable the building of an elite “eco” tourist complex. Two community activists, Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, have now been assassinated as a result.
A long discussion followed the screening. It was pointed out that dispossession of indigenous peoples for a super-elite tourism has already happened in other parts of Mexico, for example, the Sian Ka’an Biosphere Reserve in Quintana Roo. The indigenous are not allowed to live there any more, and are only allowed in as servants. It is now a rich peoples’ “paradise” which excludes nearly everyone.
The tourist development is part of an infrastructure programme including the newly opened airport at Palenque and the new highway being built from San Cristóbal de las Casas to Palenque, which is also meeting fierce resistance from some indigenous communities on the route. The meeting discussed reviving an earlier Europe-wide campaign organised around the issues of tourism and dispossession in relation to Agua Azul. This is an elite tourism made possible by dispossession and assassination, an expensive holiday at the cost of other people’s misery. Do the liberal elites know the implications of their “eco” tourist paradise?
Those present felt that the history of struggle of San Sebastián Bachajón is part of a countrywide struggle, and that they need to take action in response. The situation is of increasing concern – assassinations without repercussions, people in prison who have committed no crimes, a culture of impunity, physical and structural violence and dispossession affecting the whole of Mexico. Governments, banks and corporations violate human rights, the rule of law and all moral and ethical norms with impunity on a daily basis, buying silence in the face of their crimes; money has replaced ethics as the basis of action. This has creating a fear to speak out or protest; those who do so face imprisonment, torture and assassination.
The meeting agreed that when presenting the Bachajón video, it should be done in the context of the ethics of dispossession and impunity. No money in the world can pay for the lives of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano. The mother earth, the countryside and cities are being plundered and sold without consultation. It was decided that the main organising efforts of the network should concentrate on the theme of the forthcoming EZLN seminar on “Ethics in the face of Dispossession.”
It was decided to raise these proposals at the forthcoming meeting of the Europa Zapatista network, to be held in June. They could also be the theme of a forum at this year’s London Anarchist Bookfair. Network members agreed to write a letter voicing their deep concerns and to deliver it to the Mexican Embassy in London.
The UK Zapatista Solidarity Network sends greetings of solidarity to the compas of San Sebastián Bachajón, and thanks the women of the ejido for their moving message.
The video “Bachajón – Dispossession is death, Life is resistance.” Can be viewed on:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJkVziBk214
******************************************************************************
Juan Vázquez, memory and pride of Bachajón.
Report of the “Committee of Solidarity with the Peoples” from Cantabria, Spain, on the first anniversary of the death social activist Juan Vázquez, Tzeltal indigenous assassinated in northern Chiapas.
Juan Vázquez, memory and pride of Bachajón.
Iker Garcia Urbina
28th April, 2014
On 26th April, the dignified people of San Sebastián Bachajón, in the municipality of Chilón , honoured the memory of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, community leader, defender of indigenous rights and adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, killed a year ago at the hands of paramilitaries.
The political act was held at the headquarters of the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, at Cumbre Na’choj, and was attended by Juan’s relatives and community members, as well as autonomous authorities and various members of social organizations and international collectives who wanted to show solidarity and support the event.
During the commemoration, which began with words of welcome to all present, a minute of silence was observed in memory of the compañeros and a prayer was raised for the late Juan Vázquez Guzmán.
This was followed by the contribution of the autonomous authorities present at the event, who reaffirmed the struggle that the communities are carrying out against the injustices of the bad government and in the defence of territory as the basis of their way of life. In this sense they remembered the late Juan Vázquez Guzmán as an example to follow of strength, conviction and generosity.
They also remembered the recently assassinated Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, who at the time of his death was a Regional Coordinator of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle for the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón.
In the contribution of the relatives of Juan Vázquez, they demanded justice and denounced the impunity with which both murders were committed, and the total inaction of the appropriate authorities, whether state, federal, or local, some of whom are linked to armed paramilitary groups.
Bachajón is not alone in its struggle
There were many expressions of solidarity shown by various national and international groups to the people of Bachajón.
In addition to the words spoken by the women of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón and members of the ejido San Jerónimo, both adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, some of the statements and messages of support from both Mexican and international organizations were read out. Among the examples of international solidarity letters were received from France, the Spanish State, Italy, Germany, the UK, Norway, and New Zealand, among others. Also compañeros from solidarity organizations in the Basque Country and Cantabria, who were present at the event, addressed some words of affection and solidarity to the dignified people of San Sebastián Bachajón.
A whole day of solidarity and community in dignified joy
During the day, in addition to the homage, some fun activities and workshops were also held, in which the whole community participated, especially the smallest ones, who enjoyed moments of joy and revelry.
On Friday afternoon members of social organizations aboard the climate caravan arrived in Bachajón, and the community offered them a warm welcome. Even before dinner the youngest ones, and some not so young, spent an enjoyable time with inflatable balloons and twisted balloon figures which the visitors gave them. After a delicious dinner in the community, some short films and a documentary were screened to entertain them the night before the celebration.
After the ceremony, silkscreen workshops were also held, where anyone who wished to could print their shirt with the image of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, and the words “Juan Vázquez lives” and “the Bachajón struggle continues”. The balloon twisting workshop was also repeated by popular demand from the children.
In addition, the participants in the climate caravan surprised the children with their giant mural under the title “Mesoamerica resists,” where we can find representations of some of the struggles which are being carried out on the continent in defence of the territory and the environment. Subsequently it was the young ones who surprised the visitors with their artistic talents filling the illustration with colour.
On April 26, the dignified people of San Sebastián Bachajón remembered and honoured Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano not with mourning, but with pride, joy and commitment to continue their struggle.
**********************************************************
Impunity and Dispossession in Mexico: Life and death, land and resistance: San Sebastián Bachajón on the anniversary of the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán
The following article has been published on Upside Down World: http://upsidedownworld.org/main/mexico-archives-79/4822-impunity-and-dispossession-in-mexico-san-sebastian-bachajon-on-the-anniversary-of-the-assassination-of-juan-vazquez-guzman
In San Sebastián Bachajón, the impunity given to their attackers has not stopped the resistance to the dispossession of their lands.
The bad government, say the ejidatarios: “uses public forces, such as the state preventive police, the army and the federal police to terrorize communities and so imposes terror to achieve its goals.”
In recognition of the first anniversary of the assassination of community leader and defender of the land, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues! have been called, from Thursday, April 24 to Thursday, May 8, 2014. As part of this initiative, the screening of the video “Bachajón – Dispossession is death, Life is resistance” is being promoted internationally.
**
“What the government does is send people to jail or order their killing like Juan Vázquez Guzmán. Our struggle is not for economic or political power. It is for the people, the mother earth and the territory.” – Marcelo Mariano López, Bachajón
On April 24, 2013, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, much-loved spokesperson and activist in defence of the people, the land and the territory of the ejido (communal landholding) of San Sebastián Bachajón, was killed with six gunshots in the doorway of his home, in what was widely interpreted as a political assassination. His killers, and those who ordered his killing, remain unpunished, and the plans of the government and corporations to dispossess the ejidatarios (common landholders) of their territory, in order to construct a luxury tourist development, continue. But the indigenous Tzeltal community of San Sebastián Bachajón is staying organized, carrying on the struggle for their rights and keeping alive the memory of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and his work in the service of his people.
**
The struggle for the land
Founded in 1980 by the original Tzeltal inhabitants, the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón is situated in the municipality of Chilón, in Chiapas, south-east Mexico. It is, at 70,000 hectares, one of the largest ejidos in the country, in an area of great biodiversity and natural beauty. The land is rich in natural resources, verdant jungle, wildlife and water. The spectacular waterfalls of Agua Azul, renowned for the turquoise colour of their water at certain times of year, crash and thunder in the neighbouring municipality of Tumbalá, but to gain access to the “Ecotourism Centre” there it is necessary to cross through the ejido of Bachajón, which is why an intense conflict has arisen.
As part of the Plan Mesoamerica, the Mexican government, in consultation with transnational corporations, has drawn up plans, through the National Tourism Foundation (FONATUR), for the Palenque Integrally Planned Centre (CIPP), a network of infrastructure and services through which the natural and archaeological attractions will be used to promote an elite tourism, resulting in the displacement of the indigenous population. Agua Azul is to be the focus of this development, with very expensive luxury hotels accessed by helicopter, which the ejidatarios describe as: “neoliberal tourism projects which are only for the rich, and for which we will only carry the luggage and clean the toilets.” This plan also involves a highway from San Cristóbal de las Casas to Palenque, and the new international airport at Palenque, which was inaugurated on February 12, 2014 by Manuel Velasco Coello, governor of Chiapas, and Enrique Peña Nieto, President of Mexico.
Much of the land worked by the ejidatarios is reclaimed land, recuperated from large ranchers and landowners in 1994. To the indigenous peoples land is everything – it is the mother earth which gives them life and feeds them, it is their ancestors, their history, their culture, their honour, their identity. The attempts over the last eight years to strip them of their communally owned and worked territory have been relentless, marked by threats, violence, terror, imprisonment, torture, paramilitary activity, and a constant police and military presence.
The ejidatarios described their situation in a communiqué on 17 August, 2013: “The struggle of our people of San Sebastian Bachajón is to conserve our indigenous territory which we inherited from our ancestors, it is where we live, it gives us life and identity. We are defending our land with our lives if necessary, against the ambition of the government and of the lords of money who want to build luxury hotels, golf courses and runways for rich tourists, at the cost of the exploitation, marginalization and discrimination of our people; faced with the defence we have mounted against these projects the government has had only one answer: repression, imprisonment and death.”
History of resistance
“The Tzeltales are a combative people”, says their lawyer Ricardo Lagunes Gasca in the film ‘Bachajón – Dispossession is death. Life is resistance,’ “they have always defended and sought to keep control of their territory.” On March 19, 2007, many of the ejidatarios of San Sebastian Bachajón declared themselves adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, an initiative promoted by the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN). They marked this action by appointing their own authorities, as the ejidal officials were very close to the government. As they put it in a communique: “Since 2007 the bad government has intervened in the internal life of our community to impose ejidal representatives as they please, who serve them as if they were their minions to defend the interests of the capitalists and not those of the indigenous people.”
Following this decision in 2007, the adherents decided to exert their right as original peoples to free determination over their land and its resources, and erected a tollbooth in their territory where tourists would pay to visit the Agua Azul waterfalls. It was decided in their assembly what to do with the money taken. Mainly, they say, it was used for the sick, and to support families in need, but this money was not just used for the adherents to the Sixth Declaration, it was available to every member of the community who was experiencing hard times, including the government supporters.
The tollbooth became a focal point for the conflict. There was a violent eviction in 2009. The booth was reclaimed, but on February 2, 2011, in a huge operation, police and armed political party supporters again evicted the ejidatarios and 117 people were arrested. At this time, the authorities not only took over control of the tollbooth, they also illegally seized 2,590 square metres of communally owned lands.
As a result, in March 2011, the ejidatarios filed a petition for amparo (legal protection) in defence of their territory, a case that has still not been resolved. In January and March 2014, the ejidatarios denounced that the government-supporting authorities of ejido were attempting, through fraud and deception, to seek the annulment of the case for amparo 274/2011. On 5th February 2014 the ejidatarios adherents to the Sixth Declaration demanded, before the Unitary Agricultural Tribunal in Comitán, the annulment of the appointment of the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez, and the other officialist ejidal authorities, for their failure to act in accordance with the Agrarian Law and the traditional laws of the community. The case remains ongoing.
It is in this context that the political murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán must be set. Active in the defence of the land and territory of Bachajón since 2006, on April 18, 2010, he was made Secretary General of the three centres of the ejido. “People sought him out a lot for his skills and abilities to relate to the world of the Caxlanes(white people, non-indigenous),” said Lagune Gasca, “to defend and translate the problems of the indigenous communities and to put them on the table of the authorities”.
A second assassination
On March 21st, 2014, Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, a regional coordinator for the Sixth in Bachajón, was ambushed and killed with over twenty gunshots. At the time of his death he was travelling to his community of Virgen de Dolores, which, along with the community of Nah Choj, was founded by the adherents to the Sixth Declaration in 2010.
In the film, ‘Land and Resistance in San Sebastián Bachajón’, the ejidatarios describe the recuperation of the lands of Virgen de Dolores. “On 31 December 2009 we ‘entered’ the lands which the Caxlanes had taken from us, but really these lands did not belong to them but to our ancestors, so we their children decided to recover them”….” the Caxlanes were not working the lands which they stole, just using them for livestock. Now, in contrast, we work with the machete, we grow corn, plant coffee, yams, squash, banana…and to poor people who suffer like us we give a bit of help sometimes to support them a little.” “Up to now, we have not bought anything, we harvest everything here in this land.” “The land is like our mother, we live here, we eat here, we die here and then we remain here.”
“Compañero Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano,” say the ejidatarios in a communiqué of 31 March, “is part of the foundation and construction of autonomy in the Virgen de Dolores community, his work for the organization and the community will never be forgotten because we carry it in our hearts…. Ever since we founded the communities of Nah Choj and Virgen de Dolores in 2010, our organization has been harassed at various times by the army and state preventive police, threatening us with eviction…..
“The bad government wants to finish us off completely by assassinating our compañeros, using their paramilitary gunmen, who with complete impunity, whether by night or in the full light of day, are able to vilely murder our compañeros who are working and struggling to construct a world in which other worlds fit.”
Dispossession and repression throughout Mexico
Bachajón’s lawyer emphasises that the strategies of dispossession are the same throughout Mexico. “The government arrives, divides the communities, buys leaders or ejidatarios, undermines struggles, promotes one group and treats it as legitimate, represses, imprisons and kills those who do not agree with it.” He continues: “With repression and impunity, the State is seeking a way to establish dispossession and privatization of indigenous territories to ensure that land is handed over for the implementation of large-scale projects, designed by international private corporations or organizations. This is an integral part of the strategy of dispossession of indigenous peoples.” This strategy can be seen a continuation of the 522-year long racist attack against indigenous people, subjecting them to persecution, discrimination and marginalisation; it is also another instance of ‘accumulation by dispossession’.
A recently-released report by Global Witness reveals a surge in the killing of activists protecting land rights and the environment over the past decade, with nearly three times as many deaths in 2012 as there were10 years previously. Between 2002 and 2013, at least 908 activists were killed in 35 countries, with only 10 convictions. The death rate has risen in the past four years to an average of two activists a week.
This report highlights what has become a campaign of terror against defenders of territory, using incarceration and assassination as its weapons. The bad government, say the ejidatarios: “uses public forces, such as the state preventive police, the army and the federal police to terrorize communities and so imposes terror to achieve its goals.” It “wants to fill our lands with death and fear, so we get tired and no longer continue to defend our life, the people, our mother earth.”
Juan Vázquez Guzmán – where they sow fear, they also sow resistance
In the video promoted by the campaign, the ejidatario Domingo Pérez explains that for the people of San Sebastián Bachajón Juan is not dead, he still lives with them in the struggle for land, territory, freedom and justice. They can never forget him or give up the struggle because he is struggling beside them. “What will we teach our children? And to our children’s children?” “Juan lives, so the struggle of Bachajon lives!”
In their contribution to the Indigenous National Congress, Juan’s people said: “We know that the lords of money and power are planning everywhere, day and night, how to end our world, wanting us and all we represent to disappear. We who are indigenous struggle to continue to be what we are, to build our own way of life and to conserve our territory, defending it from the ambition of those above, because to them we are only an obstacle to their being increasingly rich and powerful; they order the killing of our brothers, dignified men and women who fight to defend the Mother Earth, they imprison us, torture us and make us disappear, but they forget that we are one, that we are not alone and that as children of the earth our roots are still alive in spite of all the death that they offer us.
Their homage finishes: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán, you are the heart of the people, you live in every child, woman and man who defends the people and struggles for justice. You told us that the land the mountains and the waterfalls belong to those who take care of them, that is why you defended and gave your life for the mother earth….Your word will be etched in our minds and we will carry your example throughout our lives. Compa Juan, you will live for always amongst your people, your heart was very great. Viva Juan Vázquez Guzmán!”
**
The Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!from Thursday, April 24th to Thursday, May 8th, 2014, follows a very successful week of action held last year, and intends to draw attention to the struggle of the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, and honour the living memory of Juan Vázquez Guzmán. Movement for Justice in El Barrio, Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, the Committee of the True Word from Kolkata, India and the Committee of the
True Word from Alisal are calling for solidarity actions especially the organising of screenings of the video ‘Bachajón – Dispossession is death, Life is resistance.’
**
This article was first published in Spanish in Desinformémonos: http://desinformemonos.org/2014/04/la-vida-y-la-muerte-la-tierra-y-la-resistencia-en-san-sebastian-bachajon/
Watch the videos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJkVziBk214 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-kfc4Z0YpvE
For further information in English: https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com/en-ingles/
******************************************************************************
Red Contra La Represión: One year after the murder of Juan Vazquéz Guzmán, a letter to the members of the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido
To our friends from San Sebastián Bachajón, family members and friends of Juan Vazquéz Guzmán:
It is one year ago that Juan Vazquéz Guzmán was murdered. One year ago, and the crime still goes unpunished, as a taunt, as a sign, as a warning to those who have decided to walk the path towards freedom. Although we have only taken the first steps of the Sexta – with its stumbling blocks and lessons, with joy, with pain and rage – we are already an affront to those who want to see us immobile, to keep us within paternalism, dependent subjects of power, obedient, delegating our political and social responsibilities to those who will use them for their own gain – personal and family, party and power.
With you, we are walking and learning so much, and with you we also feel the pain, the rage and the unease of the crime. We cannot forget our dead, we cannot forget our friend Juan Vazquéz Guzmán, his joy, his spirit and his struggle. Neither can we forget the recent murder of our friend Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, our young friend, 22 years of age, or forget that their murders have been planned from some government or business office in order to halt the process being developed in its territory, so much does it bother, so much does it hurt the economic and power interests in the area and outside it.
Often, words in response to pain and death are limited; often they do not manage to communicate all that we feel. The poet Rafael Alberti expresses it well:
When so much we suffer sleepless for blood,
circulating in the air, they only hear rage,
that in the marrow, hate awakens and trembles
and in the flesh, vengeance continuously throbs
and words then do not work: they’re words.
Manifestos, articles, commentaries, discourses,
drifting smoke, patterned mists,
what paper pain that the wind must sweep away,
what ink mourning that water must erase!
Nonetheless, our word too, we believe, is not just confined to paper. It also trangresses the limits of discourses and ink and is incarnate, it lives in our acts, and in the building of worlds, as our Zapatista friends show us exemplarily, as do others in other parts of Mexico, of the continent, of the world, as do you from the corner of Chiapas called San Sebastián Bachajón.
Juan Vázquez lives!
Juan Carlos Gómez lives!
Our struggles continue!
Against dispossession and repression:
solidarity!
Red Contra la Represión y por la Solidaridad
(RvsR)
******************************************************************************
From Dusseldorf, Germany: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The struggle of Bachajón continues!
To our friends from the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido:
To our friends adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle:
To our Zapatista friends:
To our friends from the Movimiento por Justicia del Barrio (New York), from Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group (England), from the Committee of the True Word in Calcutta (India), and from the Committee of the True Word in Alisal (California):
To our friends in the entire world:
Dusseldorf, Germany, 26th April, 2014
Friends:
On the 24th of April, 2014, we held in our autonomous social centre an event about the so-caled “development policy” of the bad government of our country, Germany. This policy, which means nothing but development by plunder, traverses the world, defending the interests of power and capital. It is neo-colonial and exploitative. The event has been dedicated exclusively to the “Selva Maya” project which is being carried out in the south of Mexico, Guatemala and Belize: a project of biopiracy, through which our government and big businesses in Germany attempt to steal, in this zone, natural resources, as well as the ancestral knowledge of its inhabitants, with the aim of converting them into mere merchandise. This is a project against which innumerable communities and organizations in Chiapas and other affected areas are fighting (see http://www.aldeah.org/es/mexico-vuelve-la-biopirateria-nuestras-tierras).
During this event, we commemorated the cowardly murder of our friend Juan Vázquez Guzmán, from the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido in Chiapas, Mexico, on the 24th of April, 2013. Juan was a community leader and spokesperson for his community, which struggles against the strategy of dispossession implemented by the bad government of Mexico and big tourism businesses, which threaten the community. The bad government and said businesses want to take control of communal lands in order to construct a luxury tourist complex in the very zone that the German government is carrying out its biopiracy project. Repressing and killing, they follow through on their interests to plunder. Recently, on the 21st of March, 2014, they also killed Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, regional co-ordinator of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle in San Sebastián Bachajón.
At this event, we also reaffirmed our protest against this strategy of death and of capital. But above all, we reaffirmed our solidarity with the struggle of the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido: Friends of San Sebastián Bachajón, with the murders of Juan and Juan Carlos, the oppressors tried to end your struggle, but we know that they failed. Your struggle continues, with strength and honour.
During these days, one year after Juan’s murder, we are with you and your struggle. With our action, and the photo that we attach to this letter, we want to give you strength, both to you and to your struggle: Continue to struggle! we here too are doing the same!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The struggle of Bachajón continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano lives! The struggle of Bachajón continues, and continues, and continues!
Fraternally,
¡Alerta!, group from Dusseldorf/Germany
Ya Basta Rhein/Main, group from Frankfurt/Germany
and visitors from the autonomous social centre, Linkes Zentrum – Hinterhof in Dusseldorf/Germany
******************************************************************************
At Bard College in New York: We Denounce the Ongoing Repression of the Community of San Sebastian Bachajón!
Compañer@s,
A group of university students at Bard College in Annandale-On-Hudson, NY, organized a screening of the most recent video regarding the ejidatarios (communal landholders) of San Sebastian Bachajón. The students who screened the video represented two organized campus groups, the Student Labor Dialogue (SLD), and the Latin American Student Organization (LASO). Under the banner of the Student Labor Dialogue students and workers rally together for better wages and benefits for Bard employees. The Latin American Student Organization strives to represent Latin America and show different aspects of its culture from its traditions to its politics.
This video chronicled the experiences of the community and documented the violent, tragic death of Juan Vasquez Guzman a year ago and the recent death of Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano. Both of these men lost their lives due to the greed of the bad government and the corporations that they serve. They served as inspirations in their struggle against the wholesale theft of the land of the ejidatarios and violent harassment and repression of their peoples.
These students were appalled by the conditions and treatment that the community members face as depicted in the video. They were particularly shocked by the torture endured and described by one member of the community. They saw first-hand how the bad governments of Mexico seek to deny the people of San Sebastián Bachajón their right to self-determination, to the free enjoyment of their territory and its natural resources, and to a dignified life. It is clear that the bad governments and their corporate interests intend to seize the ancestral lands of the ejido. Regarding Bachajón, the LASO organization said: “We cannot begin to describe how much we admire the power and resistance of your community. Although we are far away, we are also fighting by your side for a more humane world and a land of freedom. Long live the struggle of San Sebastián Bachajón!”
A few days later, at their membership meeting, the Student Labor Dialogue wrote the following statement:
The Bard College Student Labor Dialogue stands in solidarity with the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón. We stand by them in their struggle for indigenous autonomy and self-determination, and their right to their ancestral land.
We send our condolences to the friends and family of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and all those who have sacrificed themselves in the struggle for justice against a government in service of corporate profits. We demand an end to the criminalization of resistance and an end to the use of violence by the state which has unjustly robbed the people of San Sebastián Bachajón. The world has seen your struggle and you are an inspiration to people fighting for justice everywhere, including our fight for economic justice on Bard’s campus.
******************************************************************************
Colombia and England participate in the Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
The Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!, a demand for justice for the people of this community in Chiapas, Mexico, takes place from April 24th until 8th May, 2014. It aims to show solidarity with, and disseminate information about, the struggle of the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle from San Sebastián Bachajón, and to remember and honour Juan Vázquez Guzmán, the assassinated activist and much-loved defender of the human rights, land and territory of this community.
As part of these two weeks, all around the world people are gathering together to watch a video entitled Bachajón – Dispossession is death, Life is resistance. The video shows the struggle of the common landholders of San Sebastián Bachajón to defend their ancestral lands and territory from dispossession to facilitate the building of an elite tourism development. As indigenous Tzeltales they experience discrimination, marginalisation and persecution as a result of their being original peoples of these lands, as well as for their love for their mother earth. Juan Vázquez Guzmán was murdered as a consequence of his leadership in this struggle, his love for his land and people, his passion for liberty and justice.
In two different towns in England, and in a community in Colombia, groups in solidarity with the compañer@s of Bachajon came together to watch this video, and to remember Juan, on April 24th, 2014, the first anniversary of his assassination. They met in the knowledge that other groups in the United Kingdom, Mexico and the United States were also joining together on that day for the same purpose. The video shows that, for his compañer@s, Juan still lives, he is still present struggling with them, and that his struggle will continue.
Tragically, a message at the end of the video tells of the recent assassination of another activist, Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, who was killed on March 21st this year. The video also tells the story of two of the men from Bachajon who were imprisoned unjustly for crimes they did not commit, and the former prisoners tell of the torture they were subjected to.
The video portrays the violence and repression experienced by this community as a result of their efforts to construct their autonomy and to live a dignified life according to their own customs and traditions, and the continual violation of their basic human rights. The three levels of government and their allies in transnational businesses use not only their police and military forces, but also fund and arm the development of local paramilitary groups to promote terror and violence. But, the ejidatarios say, they will carry on until they die, “defending what is ours, what belonged to our grandparents, the territory.”
The three groups each found the video very moving and the story very powerful. They also watched a short video of commemoration for Juan Vázquez Guzmán and his dignified life and work. We remember him, as his compañeros say, “so that his memory may remain alive and continue to give us the strength to resist the repression and the policies of death of the bad government.” No one has been held responsible for his death by the authorities, there has been no justice.
All three groups wish to send greetings of sympathy, support and solidarity to the compas of San Sebastián Bachajón and the families of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano. They hope many other groups will screen the video and join the Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues! from Thursday, April 24th to Thursday, May 8th, 2014.
The Committees of the True Word from Southwest England and Western Colombia and Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group
The video “Bachajón – Dispossession is death, Life is resistance.” Can be viewed on:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJkVziBk214
The video of commemoration can be viewed on: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqvq9SSiGrw
****************************************************************************
The ejido San Sebastián Bachajón demands justice for their murdered compañeros.
April 27, 2014
“With these killings the government thought it could put a stop our struggle, but it was wrong, the life and the path of our brothers lives on in our hearts and gives us strength to continue defending our mother earth.”
April 26, 2014. This Saturday morning in Cumbre Nachoj, headquarters of the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle from San Sebastian Bachajón, municipality of Chilón, Chiapas, indigenous communities held an act to remember Juan Vázquez Guzmán, an indigenous Tzeltal who was assassinated a year ago for defending their land, but the authorities have not identified the material and intellectual authors of the murder.
The emotional ceremony in memory of Juan Vázquez began with a minute of silence for the political assassination of the indigenous leader and for the recent death of Juan Carlos Gómez, also a Tzeltal coordinator, who a month ago was killed on the outskirts of the municipal headquarters in broad daylight for being in the resistance. During the tribute the indigenous of northern Chiapas also raised their customary prayer, in their mother tongue, for their fallen compañeros.
Subsequently the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón invited all present to sing the Mexican national anthem and the Zapatista hymn, which were sung with firmness and dignity. Moments later the ejidal authorities one by one were giving their word in their Tzeltal language, where the constant theme was their conviction to defend the land and territory, and to oppose megaprojects as did Juan Vázquez and Juan Carlos Gómez.
In this act the women of the ejido also said their word in honour of the worldwide days for justice for San Sebastian Bachajón. “We thank you very much for following our struggle, with your support we are encouraged to continue to resist the politics of death and contempt of the bad government” they said. “Our people have suffered repression and death as a result of the struggle we started in 2007 against the imposition of tourist projects which seek to take over our land to give it to businessmen,” they continued. “With these killings the government thought it could stop our struggle, but it was wrong, the life and the path of our brothers lives on in our hearts and gives us the strength to continue to defend our mother earth.” said the indigenous in resistance.
During the commemorative event the ejidatarios adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle read letters of solidarity from Milan, Italy, Mexico, the Spanish State, France, Germany, Norway, New Zealand, The United States, the Basque country and Chiapas.
Shortly afterwards the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón read a communiqué which gave evidence of the dispossession which capitalism commits on indigenous communities, and denounced the “trickery and corruption of the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez, his vigilance councilman Samuel Díaz Guzmán and the former ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, who are accomplices of the government’s dispossession.” Finally the Tzeltales stated unequivocally that they will continue to defend their land and territory despite the adversities they come up against.
*************************************************************************
Homage is paid to the leaders and defenders of the land assassinated in Chilón, Chiapas
** Accusation of attempts to dispossess land for a toll road and a commercial centre
** “Our struggle is peaceful, but we demand respect,” say the ejido owners and adherents to the Sixth
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, a regional coordinator of the Sixth in Chilón, executed with more than 20 gunshots last March 21 on the road to his community, Virgen de Dolores. Photo: provided by the Gómez Silvano family
Tzeltal ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, in Chilón, Chiapas, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, rendered homage this Saturday to two leaders assassinated in recent months, “who fell in the defence of their people and their territory,” Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano.
In the message read today in the community of Nah Choj, the Indigenous said: “We know that capitalism doesn’t rest day or night in order to dispossess us of our culture and of Mother Earth, because it wants to make businesses and a lot of money that goes into the pocket of the big entrepreneurs. All that capitalism leaves us is poverty, misery, violence, prison and death; it wants to kill our hope and our way of life so that only capitalist life, individualism and the law of the strongest exist.”
They remembered that Juan Vázquez Guzmán “understood the traps of the bad government and capitalism and because of that he embraced the struggle even more and the love for his people grew, working without rest for the liberation of political prisoners and for the defence of the lands. He dreamed about his people being free of the oppression of capitalism. Juan was not afraid of doing work for his people; he was always a brave compañero who struggled for his community to live well.”
The night of April 24, 2013, he was assassinated at the door of his house “by the bad government, to try to silence the voice and hope of our organization,” the ejido owners maintained; “as they also did last March 21 to Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano,” who was a regional coordinator, “still young and with a lot of participation in the organization.”
“Our struggle is peaceful, but we demand that the three levels of the bad government respect our people, because we are not going to remain seated watching how they continue violating our rights,” they emphasized.
The Tzeltal community of the Northern Zone denounced: “the contrivances and corruption of ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez, his vigilance councilman Samuel Díaz Guzmán and the former ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, who are accomplices of the government’s dispossession and are not content with what they have done. They want to continue dispossessing more lands to make way for the toll road from San Cristóbal de las Casas to Palenque and for a Aurrerá [1] commercial centre in Bachajón, because they are government puppets and have done it completely behind the back of the community for personal interest.”
Lastly, they pointed out that the situation in the country “is more difficult all the time for the communities and for the peoples. They want to accelerate the privatization of our territories and exploiting them for the million-dollar benefit of the few; it is a lie that it is for progress and development, because it is only a pretext for taking our lands away from us. They are death projects.” Therefore, they called “to struggle organized and to defend the life of our peoples,” and they greeted “the peoples and communities of Mexico and the world in resistance against the capitalist megaprojects of dispossession.”
Meanwhile, dozens of solidarity organizations from France, Italy, Germany, Belgium, the United Kingdom and Spain demanded from the Mexican government “the return of communal lands to the San Sebastián Bachajón population; respect for the rights of these Tzeltal indigenous peoples over their lands and territories; respect for their right to free determination and their search for alternative ways of life.”
—————————————————————————–
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Sunday, April 27, 2014
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2014/04/26/politica/013n1pol
English translation by the Chiapas Support Committee for the International Zapatista Translation Service
[1] Bodega Aurrera is a Mexican discount-store owned by Walmart..
******************************************************************************
A year later they ask for justice and remember Juan Vázquez in the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas.
April 26, 2014 was the anniversary of the death of Juan Vázquez from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón in the state of Chiapas, who was assassinated in the defence of the ejidal land and territory against tourism and highway megaprojects. His compañeros and family members met together in the community of Cumbre Na Choj to remember him and revindicate the struggle he defended until his death.
Groups in solidarity with the indigenous campesinos attended the event and letters were read from people around the world who remembered Juan and greeted the just struggle of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle promoted by the Zapatista Army of National Liberation. The letters came from Italy, the US, France, Spain, the Basque Country, Sweden, Germany and multiple organizations in Mexico.
During the act they also remembered compañero Juan Gómez, a Regional Coordinator of the Sixth who weeks ago was ambushed and killed, for which, as in the case of Juan Vázquez, they demanded that justice be done in the face of the impunity that prevails in both crimes.
The Tzeltzales indigenous from Bachajón are committed to the path of autonomy and defending their land against the projects of dispossession with which capitalism threatens our people.
For more information see the following links:
Videos:
Land and Resistance in San Sebastián Bachajón: http://youtu.be/rOq9bJy6lRY
Bachajón. Dispossession is death. Life is resistance. http://youtu.be/qJkVziBk214
http://hijosmadretierra.blogspot.mx/2014/04/a-un-ano-piden-justicia-y-recuerdan.html
******************************************************************************
Communiqué from the political act, 26th April, 2014
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, ADHERENT TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 26th APRIL 2014
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international collectives and committees of solidarity
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras, on this day we join together our dignified rage to honor the memory of our compañeros who fell in the defense of their people and territory, Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano.
We thank those who joined us at a distance and those who are present today in these rebel and dignified lands of San Sebastián Bachajón, receive our combative greetings in solidarity from all the Tseltal men and women of San Sebastián Bachajón, we are in struggle defending our dignity as a people and the territory that we inherited from our grandmothers and grandfathers.
We know that capitalism will not rest day and night until it has dispossessed us of our culture and mother earth, because it wants to do business and make a lot of money to go into the moneybag of the big businessmen. The only thing that capitalism leaves us is poverty, misery, violence, prison and death, it wants to put an end to our hope and our way of life so that all that exists is capitalist life, individualism and the survival of the fittest.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán understood the trickeries of the bad government and capitalism, for this reason he embraced the struggle even more and his love for his people grew, working tirelessly for the release of political prisoners and for the defense of the lands, he dreamed of his people being free from the oppression of capitalism. Juan had no fear of working for his people, he was always a brave compañero who fought for the community to live well.
On the evening of April 24, 2013, he was killed by the bad government to try to silence his voice and the hope of our organization, as they also did to our compañero Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano on March 21st, he was a regional coordinator, still only young and with a lot of participation in the organization.
The lives of our compañeros are an example to our organization, their work continues through all the compañeros who are still struggling with dignified rage every day for the liberation of the people and for respect for our way of life as indigenous people. Our struggle is peaceful, but we demand that the three levels of the bad government respect our people because we will not be sitting quietly looking while they continue violating our rights.
We denounce the deceits and corruptions of the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez, his vigilance commissioner Samuel Díaz Guzmán, and the former ejidal commissioner Francisco Jiménez Guzmán, who are accomplices of the government plunder and are not satisfied with what they have done, they want to continue dispossessing more land to make way for the highway from San Cristobal de las Casas to Palenque and for an Aurrera shopping centre in Bachajón, because they are puppets of the government and have completely turned their backs on the community for personal interests.
The situation in the country is increasingly more difficult for the communities and peoples; they want to accelerate the privatization of our territories and exploit it for the benefit of a few millionaires, it is a lie that is for progress and development because it is just a pretext to take away the lands, they are projects of death. For this reason, the compañeros and compañeras have to organize to fight and defend the life of our people.
From the northern zone of Chiapas we send combative greetings of solidarity to the peoples and communities of Mexico and the world who are in resistance against the capitalist megaprojects of dispossession.
Never again a Mexico without us
Attentively
Land and Freedom!
Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No dispossession of indigenous territories!
******************************************************************************
From Europe: Pronouncement in Support of the Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues! from Thursday, April 24th to Thursday, May 8th, 2014!
To our sisters and brothers of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón:
To our compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle:
To our Zapatista sisters and brothers:
To the peoples of Mexico and the world:
To the independent media:
To the Committees of the True Word:
We know that the unpunished assassinations of our compañeros Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, are part of the war of extermination and dispossession against those from below which is being conducted by the governments and multinational corporations. Their aim is to eradicate the indigenous peoples of these lands, and to convert the water, the earth, even life itself into commodities, thereby plundering and destroying our mother earth in their greed and ambition to create yet more megaprojects.
The dignified struggle of the adherents to the Sixth Declaration from San Sebastián Bachajón to defend the territory which historically belongs to them, to reclaim the commonly owned lands illegally stolen from them, and to defend their way of life and the construction of their autonomy, is the reason for these vile murders. The governments and local authorities, with their state forces and their paramilitary groups, want to finish off the dignified defence of their territory by the ejidatarios of Bachajón through the use of terror, in order to build an elite tourism development.
But they will not succeed. The collective struggle for a dignified life, to “continue being what we are,” of the compañer@s from San Sebastián Bachajón continues, and we unite our struggles with theirs. We honour the memory and the continuing presence of compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán who lives and struggles alongside his people for justice, liberty, the land, the people and the territory, a struggle that has no end.
We the undersigned demand justice. We denounce these cowardly murders. We insist on a fair and open investigation and the punishment of the material and intellectual authors of these crimes. And we demand that the Mexican Government adopt all measures necessary so as to guarantee the right to life, personal integrity and security of the members of the community of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration, and to all human rights defenders.
Furthermore, we call for the return of their common lands to the people of San Sebastián Bachajón, respect for the rights of these indigenous Tzeltal peoples to their land and territory, and respect for their right to self-determination and the search for alternative ways of life.
We offer our most sincere respects to the families of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, and send greetings of solidarity and fellowship to the women, men, children and old people of San Sebastián Bachajón. We will not forget them and we will remain watchful and alert as to what happens in their lands. We join their profound hopes that the memory of Juan Vázquez Guzmán may remain alive and continue to give them the strength to resist the repression and the policies of death of the bad government, and to move forward in their struggles towards a better world.
In the demand for justice for the people of San Sebastián Bachajón and in honour of the memory of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, we offer our full support to the initiative Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!
Signatures:
ASSI (Accion Social Sindical Internacionalista)
Caracol Zaragoza
Centro de Documentación sobre Zapatismo -CEDOZ-
CGT – Estado español
Plataforma de Solidaridad con Chiapas de Aragón
Plataforma de Solidaridad con Chiapas y Guatemala de Madrid
anna pacchiani e massimo vecchi bergamo – italia
Associazione Jambo, commercio equo Fidenza –Italia
Associazione Ya Basta! Milano
Comitato Chiapas “Maribel” Bergamo, Italia
GAIA CAPOGNA, Italy
LaPirata:
– Nodo Solidale, Mexico y Roma
– Nomads, Bologna y Berlin
– Collettivo Zapatista Lugano
– Adherentes Individuales
caracol mundo-eco de latido en solidaridad
Casa Nicaragua, Lieja, Bélgica
Grupo Cafez, Lieja, Bélgica
Les trois passants, Paris, Francia
Mut Vitz 13, Marseille, Francia
UK Zapatista Solidarity Network:
-Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group
-Edinburgh Chiapas Solidarity Group
-Kiptik (Bristol)
-London Mexico Solidarity Group
-Manchester Zapatista Collective
-UK Education, Culture and Communication team
-UK Zapatista Translation Service
-Zapatista Solidarity Group – Essex
Carol M Byrne, Birmingham
Committee of the True Word for South-West England
Zap Sol UK
The video “Bachajón – Dispossession is death, Life is resistance.” Can be viewed on:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJkVziBk214
******************************************************************************
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, from the community of Virgen de Dolores, of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, who was assassinated with more than 20 high calibre bullets on 21st March, 2014.
Photo provided by relatives
******************************************************************************
Update on the Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues! which begins on April 24th, 2014
GOOD NEWS! THE WOMEN OF BACHAJÓN HAVE SENT A SPECIAL MESSAGE TO THE CAMPAIGN TO BE READ AT EVENTS!
To our sisters and brothers adherents to the Sexta of the Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón:
To our compañer@s of the Sexta:
To our Zapatista sisters and brothers:
To the peoples of Mexico and the world:
To the independent, free and autonomous media:
To the Committees of the True Word throughout the world:
Compañeras and compañeros:
Please receive many embraces from Movement for Justice in El Barrio, Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, the Committee of the True Word from Kolkata, India and the Committee of the True Word from Alisal.
The Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues! begins on April 24th, the anniversary of the assassination of our beloved compa Juan Vázquez Guzmán.
This initiative is supported by the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sexta. They say:
“On April 24th, the worldwide days for justice will begin for San Sebastian Bachajón and our fallen compañeros Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano…we will join these days with a political act…. on Saturday April 26th……We invite you to join the worldwide days to demand justice for our people, according to your own times and geographies.”
We also want to share with you the wonderful news that the dignified compañeras, the women of San Sebastián Bachajón, will send a special message to be shared at the events organised as part of the two weeks of action.
The response which the convocation in honor of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, and in support of San Sebastián Bachajón, has received from throughout the world has truly touched our hearts. Groups and collectives from countries including Mexico, South Africa, Greece, the US, India, Colombia, Canada, Gaza, Italy, England, Germany, Scotland and New Zealand have now confirmed their participation. Numerous activities will take place during the Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, The Bachajón struggle continues! from April 24th to May 8th 2014.
We are pleased to report that screenings of the video “Bachajón – Dispossession is death. Life is resistance.” have already been arranged in:
Many towns and cities in Mexico
India
South Africa
Canada
Colombia
Gaza
Germany
Greece
New Zealand
Many towns and cities in the UK
Many towns and cities in the US
We hope that more cities and countries will soon join this list.
We would like to thank these compas from different corners of the planet for joining the campaign in solidarity with the dignified struggle of our beloved compas from San Sebastián Bachajón, and to honor the memory of Juan Vázquez Guzmán.
If you have not yet confirmed your participation, we would ask you to do so as soon as possible by email to:
You can find more information in English including reports of the activities here:
https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com/en-ingles/ . Information is available on this website in five languages.
You can find posters in English, Spanish, Italian, French and German to use in solidarity activities here:
https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com/carteles/
You can see the video “Bachajón – Dispossession is death. Life is resistance.” here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJkVziBk214
Juan Vázquez Guzmán, beloved compa, we embrace you.
You are the heart of your people, and you gave your life for your people.
Your life is like a seed of hope and rebellion that is growing in the hearts of every child, woman, man and old person from San Sebastian Bachajón and in the hearts of compañeras and compañeros from around the world. Your voice will not be silenced, nor will the work of your heart be ended.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán, beloved compa and brother, guardian of the land, the struggle continues.
Land, Freedom and Justice for the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No dispossession of indigenous territories!
With love and solidarity
Movement for Justice in El Barrio, Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, the Committee of the True Word from Kolkata, India and the Committee of the True Word from Alisal
*********************************************************************
International days for Justice for San Sebastian Bachajón are announced
The inhabitants ask for punishment for paramilitaries and a halt to the dispossession of their territory for purposes of tourism
Hermann Bellinghausen
La Jornada
Saturday April 19, 2014
The ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, in the municipality of Chilón in the northern zone of Chiapas, announced that international days for justice would be taking place for the struggle of their ejido, adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, which resists attempts by the government to dispossess them of part of their territory for tourism and road construction, without the consent of the inhabitants.
This April 24th marks the first anniversary of the cowardly political assassination of their leader Juan Vázquez Guzmán. The Tzeltal ejidatarios say that, “so that his memory may remain alive and continue to give us the strength to resist the repression and the policies of death of the bad government”, on that day the “worldwide days for justice for San Sebastian Bachajón and our fallen compañeros Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano” will begin; the latter was killed with more than 20 bullets on March 21 in the outskirts of Chilón. Both crimes remain unpunished and there is no indication that the authorities have really investigated to find those responsible. It is simply a case of two executions carried out by professionals.
The international days are convened by the Movement for Justice in El Barrio, from New York, and solidarity groups in the United Kingdom and India. On the 26th a political act will be held at the headquarters of the independent organization of ejidatarios in Cumbre Nah Choj. The days will conclude on May 8th.
“Still there is no justice. There has been no effective investigation into the murder of Vázquez Guzmán, and his killers and those who ordered his execution remain safe in impunity. Meanwhile the efforts continue to dispossess Juan’s people, the ejidatarios adherents to the Sixth,” says the convocation.
“The three levels of government, with their army, their police, their allies in transnational corporations, their locally-funded paramilitary groups and their lackeys from the political parties, do not cease their attacks and their plundering, using deceptions and lies, threats, violence, imprisonment, torture and even murder to achieve their ambition to seize the ancestral common lands of the ejido in order to construct a luxury tourist complex beside the beautiful waterfalls of Agua Azul.”
With respect to the death of Gómez Silvano, who “worked in the construction of autonomy in the recuperated land of the community of Virgen de Dolores,” it also remains unpunished. The organisations convoking the two weeks of worldwide action state: “The ejidatarios will not give up their common lands, which they inherited from their grandparents, so they can be used for the building of hotels and golf courses, roads and helipads. They will not allow the mother earth and her richness of nature, jungle and water, to be destroyed by the greed and rapacity of those who would be lords of all.”
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2014/04/19/index.php?section=politica&article=018n1pol
************************************************************************
FROM THE EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, ADHERENT TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 17th APRIL 2014
To the compañer@s adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international collectives and committees of solidarity
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras in struggle, next Thursday April 24th marks a year since the cowardly political assassination of our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán; we will start this day praying with his family for the eternal rest of our compañero who is already in the arms of our mother earth, so that his memory may remain alive and continue to give us the strength to resist the repression and the policies of death of the bad government.
On this day, April 24th, the worldwide days for justice will be launched for San Sebastian Bachajón and our fallen compañeros Juan Vázquez Guzmán and Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, convoked by the Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York; we will join these days with a political act which we will make in honor of our compañeros Juan Vázquez and Juan Carlos Gómez on Saturday April 26th from 10am, hour of God, in the headquarters of the organization in Cumbre Nah Choj.
We invite you to join us in this political act on April 26th and to join, according to your times and geographies, the worldwide days to demand justice for our people.
From the north of Chiapas receive a combative embrace.
Never again a Mexico without us
Attentively
Land and Freedom!
Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No dispossession of indigenous territories!
******************************************************************************
Life and death, land and resistance
by Jessica Davies | 17 April, 2014
San Sebastián Bachajón on the anniversary of the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán
Last year, Peace News featured the story of the assassination in Chiapas, Mexico, of the community leader and defender of the land, Juan Vázquez Guzmán. In recognition of the first anniversary of his killing, ‘Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!’, have been called, from Thursday 24 April to Thursday 8 May. As part of this initiative, the screening of the film Bachajón – Dispossession is death, Life is resistance is being promoted internationally.
‘What the government does is send people to jail or order their killing like Juan Vázquez Guzmán. Our struggle is not for economic or political power. It is for the people, the mother earth and the territory.’ – Marcelo Mariano López
On 24 April 2013, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, much-loved spokesperson and activist in defence of the people, the land and the territory of the ejido(communal landholding) of San Sebastián Bachajón, was killed with six gunshots in the doorway of his home, in what was widely interpreted as a political assassination. His killers, and those who ordered his killing, remain unpunished, and the plans of the government and corporations to dispossess the ejidatarios (common landholders) of their territory, in order to construct a luxury tourist development, continue. But the indigenous Tzeltal community of San Sebastián Bachajón is staying organized, carrying on the struggle for their rights and keeping alive the memory of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and his work in the service of his people.
The struggle for the land
Founded in 1980 by the original Tzeltal inhabitants, the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón is situated in the municipality of Chilón, in Chiapas, south-east Mexico. It is, at 70,000 hectares, one of the largest ejidos in the country, in an area of great biodiversity and natural beauty. The land is rich in natural resources, verdant jungle, wildlife and water. The spectacular waterfalls of Agua Azul, renowned for the turquoise colour of their water at certain times of year, crash and thunder in the neighbouring municipality of Tumbalá, but to gain access to the ‘Ecotourism Centre’ which has been set up there it is necessary to cross through the ejido of Bachajón, which is why an intense conflict has arisen.
As part of the Plan Mesoamerica, the Mexican government, in consultation with transnational corporations has drawn up plans for a network of infrastructure and services to promote an elite tourism, which will require the displacement of the indigenous population. The focus of this development will be the waterfalls, with very expensive luxury hotels and golf courses accessed by helicopter.
Much of the land worked by the ejidatarios was recuperated from large ranchers and landowners in 1994. To the indigenous peoples land is everything – it is the mother earth which gives them life and feeds them, it is their ancestors, their history, their culture, their honour, their identity. The attempts over the last eight years to strip them of their communally owned and worked territory have been relentless, marked by threats, violence, terror, imprisonment, torture, paramilitary activity, and a constant police and military presence.
History of resistance
‘The Tzeltales are a combative people’, says their lawyer, ‘they have always defended and sought to keep control of their territory.’ On 19 March 2007, many of the ejidatarios of San Sebastian Bachajón declared themselves adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, an initiative promoted by the Zapatistas. Following this decision, the adherents decided to exert their right as original peoples to free determination over their land and its resources, and erected a tollbooth in their territory where tourists would pay to visit the Agua Azul waterfalls. It was decided in their assembly what to do with the money raised. Mainly, they say, it was used for the sick, and to support families in need, but this money was not just used for the adherents to the Sixth Declaration, it was available to every member of the community who was experiencing hard times.
The tollbooth became a focal point for the conflict. There was a violent eviction in 2009. The booth was reclaimed, but on 2 February 2011, in a huge operation, police and armed political party supporters again evicted the ejidatarios and 117 people were arrested. At this time, the authorities and government supporters not only took over control of the tollbooth, they also illegally seized 2,590 square metres of the communally owned lands.
It is in this context that the political murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán must be set. Active in the defence of the land and territory of Bachajón since 2006, on April 18, 2010, he was made Secretary General of the three centres of the ejido. ‘People sought him out a lot for his skills and abilities to relate to the world of the Caxlanes(white people, non-indigenous),’ according to their lawyer, ‘to defend and translate the problems of the indigenous communities and to put them on the table of the authorities’.
A second assassination
On 21 March 2014, Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, a regional coordinator for the Sixth in Bachajón, was ambushed and killed with over twenty gunshots. At the time of his death he was travelling to his community of Virgen de Dolores, which, along with the community of Nah Choj, was founded by the adherents to the Sixth Declaration in 2010. Juan Carlos had been one of the community’s founders, and had worked there since in the construction of autonomy.
The ejidatarios describe the recuperation of the lands of Virgen de Dolores. ‘On 31 December 2009 we “entered” the land. It was in the hands of the Caxlanes, but it really belonged to our ancestors, we as their children decided to recover these lands. The foreigners were not working the land – they were not growing crops, just using it for livestock. Now we grow all our food, we even have some to sell. We work with the machete, we grow corn, plant coffee, yams, squash, banana. We put together food parcels for those in need. The land is like our mother, we live from it, we eat from it, we die on it and then we remain in it.’
Context
Bachajón’s lawyer explains that the strategies are the same throughout Mexico. ‘With repression and impunity, the state is seeking a way to establish dispossession and privatization of indigenous territories to ensure that land is handed over for the implementation of megaprojects, designed by international private corporations or organizations.’
A recently-released report by Global Witness reveals a surge in the killing of activists protecting land rights and the environment over the past decade, with nearly three times as many deaths in 2012 as there were ten years previously. The death rate has risen in the past four years to an average of two activists a week.
This report highlights what has become a campaign of terror against defenders of territory, using incarceration and assassination as its weapons. The government, say the ejidatarios of San Sebastian Bachajón: ‘uses public forces, such as the state preventive police, the army and the federal police to terrorize communities and so imposes terror to achieve its goals.’
Juan Vázquez Guzmán – where they sow fear, they also sow resistance
In the film promoted by the campaign, the ejidatario Domingo Pérez explains that, for the people of San Sebastián Bachajón, Juan is not dead, he still lives with them in the struggle for land, territory, freedom and justice. They can never forget him or give up the struggle because he is struggling beside them. ‘What will we show to our children’s children?’
In the words of Juan’s community: ‘We are not alone and as children of the earth our roots are still alive in spite of all the death they offer us. Juan Vázquez Guzmán, you are the heart of the people, you live in every child, woman and man who defends the people and struggles for justice. You told us that the land the mountains and the waterfalls belong to those who take care of them, that is why you defended and gave your life for the mother earth. You will live for ever among your people.’
More info: The ‘Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!’ from Thursday 24 April to Thursday 8 May 2014, follows a very successful week of action held last year, and intends to draw attention to the struggle of the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, and honour the living memory of Juan Vázquez Guzmán. Movement for Justice in El Barrio, Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, the Committee of the True Word from Kolkata, India and the Committee of the True Word from Alisal are calling for solidarity actions, especially the organising of screenings of the short film Bachajón – Dispossession is death, Life is resistance (Spanish; English subtitles available by clicking on the Captions panel at the bottom of the video screen). Another (23-minute) film with English subtitles can be found here. For further information in English, please see Viva Bachajon and Dorset Chiapas.
This article was published in Peace News, 17 April, 2014: http://peacenews.info/blog/7653/life-and-death-land-and-resistance
******************************************************************************
Convocation for the
“Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives!
The Bachajón struggle continues!”
From Thursday, April 24th to Thursday, May 8th, 2014
To our sisters and brothers of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón:
To our compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle:
To our Zapatista sisters and brothers:
To the people of Mexico and the world:
To the independent media:
To the Committees of the True Word:
Movement for Justice in El Barrio, Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, the Committee of the True Word from Kolkata, India and the Committee of the True Word from Alisal propose that we join together our hands, our voices and our struggles to carry out the
“Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!” from Thursday, April 24th to Thursday, May 8th, 2014
This initiative is supported by the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth.
Compañeras and Compañeros:
We send you greetings and embraces from New York, Dorset, Kolkata and Alisal.
On April 24th, 2014, it will be a year since the cruel and cowardly assassination of our beloved compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán, activist, community leader and spokesperson for the indigenous Tzeltal community of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, in the municipality of Chilón, Chiapas, Mexico. He was killed by six gunshots in the doorway of his home.
Still there is no justice. There has been no effective investigation into Juan’s murder, and his killers and those who ordered his execution remain safe in impunity. Meanwhile the efforts continue to dispossess Juan’s people, the ejidatarios adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón.
The three levels of government, with their army, their police, their allies in transnational corporations, their locally-funded paramilitary groups and their lackeys from the political parties, do not cease their attacks and their plundering, using deceptions and lies, threats, violence, imprisonment, torture and even murder to achieve their ambition to seize the ancestral common lands of the ejido in order to construct a luxury tourist complex beside the beautiful waterfalls of Agua Azul.
Now there has been a second assassination, another vile attempt to force our compañer@s to give up their just and dignified struggle and resistance. On March 21st, 2014, Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, aged only 22, was shot down with over twenty bullets. Juan Carlos worked in the construction of autonomy in the recuperated land of the community of Virgen de Dolores. He was a regional coordinator of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón. No one has been arrested or charged with his murder. We respond with sorrow, but also with rage.
We demand justice! The killers must not remain unpunished! No more impunity!
Compañeras and Compañeros,
Although the war against the people does not end, neither does the resistance of those from below.
Despite the continuing racist repression directed against the original people of these lands, despite displacement and occupation, aggression and murder, the tireless struggle of the indigenous Tzeltal people of Bachajón to defend the basis of their life, the mother earth, the land and the territory, also has no end.
The ejidatarios will not give up their common lands, which they inherited from their grandparents, so they can be used for the building of hotels and golf courses, roads and helipads. They will not allow the mother earth and her richness of nature, jungle and water, to be destroyed by the greed and rapacity of those who would be lords of all.
For our sisters and brothers in struggle from San Sebastián Bachajón, Juan Vázquez Guzmán still lives, he is still there beside them, fighting, so they can never give up their resistance. He often told them that their struggle was “for the life of the people and to continue being what we are”.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán denounced repression and corruption everywhere, and he fought for the rights of his people and for the liberation of their prisoners. On a national and international level he made people aware of the threat to the lands of Bachajón from those from above and their plans to build an “eco” tourist megaproject.
His words had strength and his vision and heart were free from fear in the struggle for the defense of the territory. We remember his warm smile, his contagious laughter, his love for the land and the people and his commitment to the creation of another world.
But the capitalists, the governments and the corporations, in their greed for more money, more plunder, more profit, plan to destroy the whole of the mother earth, and to rip out the heart of the planet. They want to turn the water, the trees, the earth, the air into commodities. It is only the organized resistance of the autonomous communities, from below and to the left, against the wars and the destruction of our natural resources, which can save the mother earth for our children.
Compañeras and Compañeros,
We call on all people of good heart and all the children of the earth who strive, day after day, to construct another, better, world, one with freedom, justice, respect and dignity, each according to their own customs, ways, times, and geographies:
1. To carry out the “Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!” from Thursday, April 24th to Thursday, May 8th, 2014
2. To show our solidarity with the just and dignified struggle against dispossession of the women, men, children and elderly of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón
3. To screen the film Bachajón – Dispossession is death, Life is resistance, available in Spanish and with English subtitles, in as many countries and places and as many times as possible:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJkVziBk214
4. To keep alive the memory of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and to commemorate the anniversary of his savage assassination on April 24th, 2014, along with his compas, who here invite us to join them:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqvq9SSiGrw
5. To organize any other solidarity activities that you may choose, in your own places and according to your own different methods of struggle
We ask you to please let us know as soon as possible if you are able to accept our proposal and if you will be able to participate in the “Two Weeks of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!” from Thursday, April 24th to Thursday, May 8th, 2014
Please confirm your participation by email to: laotrany@yahoo.com
Juan Vázquez Guzmán, beloved compa, we embrace you. We will always be thankful to you for having given so much inspiration to each of us in our own struggles.
You are the heart of your people, and you gave your life for your people.
Your life is like a seed of hope that is growing in the hearts of every child, woman, man and old person from San Sebastián Bachajón and in the hearts of compañeras and compañeros from around the world.
We believe that everyone should know of your dignified life and the dignified resistance of your people.
We demand a full investigation of your assassination, and punishment of those responsible.
Your voice will not be silenced, nor will the work of your heart be ended.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán, beloved compa and brother, guardian of the land, the struggle continues.
Land, Freedom and Justice for the Ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón!
Stop the aggressions against the adherents to the Sexta!
No more impunity!
No more forgetting!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives!
The Bachajón struggle continues!
With love and solidarity,
Movement for Justice in El Barrio, Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, the
Committee of the True Word from Kolkata, India and the Committee of the
True Word from Alisal
************************************************************************
From Europe: Juan Carlos Gómez and Juan Vázquez Guzmán live!
To our compas Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano,
and to Juan Vázquez Guzmán and to their families
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To the compañer@s adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
Compañeros and compañeras:
When we receive the news that our compañer@s have been murdered, we always remember the phrase that goes, “Dying does not hurt, what hurts is forgetting.”
Today we say to our compañeros Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano and Juan Vázquez Guzmán that we will never forget them, nor will we forget the tireless struggle of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón.
Rage returned to flood our hearts, on Friday March 21, when Juan Carlos, who had lived only 22 years, was assassinated, killed for his rebellion, for his capacity as regional coordinator of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, killed for being a compañero, who, like many other compas from Bachajón, will not give up.
This murder carries with it the names of the governors who continue to harass and plunder in order to take over the land that never was, nor will be, theirs, this murder carries with it the name of the Municipal President of Chilón, Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, member of the Green Ecologist party and one of the authors of the dispossession of lands by financing the arms of the armed group of Carmen Aguilar Gómez the Elder, Juan Alvaro Gómez and Manuel Jiménez, responsible for the eviction of the toll booth in February 2011. This murder, like the persecution, imprisonment and repression, carries with it the names of Manuel Velasco Coello and Enrique Peña Nieto.
And as the compas say in their communiqué: “like our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán said, our struggle is for the life of our people and because we want to continue to be what we are.”
We, collectives, groups, organizations, we do not forget, and from our different geographies we extend not only our condolences, it is true that we grieve, but also the rage that impels us to organization, the pain which will not break us, the pain which leads us inevitably to continue standing in struggle for the world we want, for the freedom we long for, for the dreams we continue to aspire to achieve one day.
For our dead!
Against forgetting!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano lives!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives!
Not to the dispossession of territories!
Freedom for Political prisoners!
The Bachajón Struggle continues!
In solidarity
Signatures:
Les trois passants,París,Francia
La Confederación General del Trabajo (CGT) Estado español
Caracol Solidario, Besançon, Francia
Gruppe B.A.S.T.A., Münster, Alemania.
LaPirata compuesto por:
-Colectivo Zapatista Marisol, Lugano
-Nodo Solidale, Roma y México
-Nomads, Bologna y Berlín
-Adherentes individuales
Caracol Zaragoza, Estado español
Asociación Ya Basta! Milano, Italia
Centro de Documentación sobre Zapatismo -CEDOZ- Estado español
ASSI (Acción Social Sindical Internacionalista)
Plataforma de Solidaridad con Chiapas de Aragón
UK Zapatista Solidarity Network
Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group
Edinburgh Chiapas Solidarity Group
Kiptik (Bristol)
London Mexico Solidarity Group
Manchester Zapatista Collective
UK Zapatista Translation Service
Zapatista Solidarity Group – Essex
Committee of the True Word for South-West England
Union syndicale Solidaires, Francia
Fédération SUD éducation, Francia
red YA-BASTA-NETZ, Alemania
YA BASTA RheinMain, Alemania
¡Alerta! – Lateinamerika Gruppe Düsseldorf, Alemania
Plataforma de Solidaridad con Chiapas y Guatemala de Madrid
Comite de Solidaridad con los Pueblos de Chiapas en Lucha, CSPCL
**************************************************************************
Juan Vázquez Lives. Invitation to Commemoration
–
A year after the death of our compañero Juan, adherent to the sixth declaration of the Lacandon jungle, we invite media and society in general to a political event on the 26th April 2014 in cumbre Na’choj to remember our compañero.
–
–
******************************************************************************
Bachajón: Death and life in the waterfalls of Agua Azul
The ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, explain the interests which exist behind the waterfalls of Agua Azul and the region around them.
Water of Life
Squash and chayote, sapodilla and beans, citrus fruits and corn grow around the waterfalls of Agua Azul. Boas, ocelots and jaguars, tapirs and toucans live around the waterfalls of Agua Azul. Also, men and women, indigenous peoples, mainly Tzeltal, belong to the waterfalls of Agua Azul.
The ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle – a political initiative of the EZLN in 2005 – explain that there are great interests in the Waterfalls and the region around them. All of which they call their “mother earth.”
“It is the richest part of the State of Chiapas,” says Domingo Perez, a resident of Bachajón. “There is everything: oil, gold … that is why the government has its sights on this area.”
Protected Forest Area, Wildlife Refuge and Special Biosphere Reserve (according to a presidential decree of April 29, 1980), the Agua Azul waterfalls are unmistakable due to the light colour of their water caused by constantly falling on limestone.
Agua Azul Waterfalls
The whole area (the waterfalls of Agua Azul, the Lacandón Jungle, the beaches of Catazajá, the waterfalls of Misol Ha and Palenque) falls within the tourism plans of the government headed by Manuel Velasco. All this is proposed in the CIPP (Palenque Integrally Planned Centre), in which there are plans for the construction of Palenque Airport and the San Cristobal -Palenque highway (which directly affects the Tzotzil communities of Mitzitón and Ejido Los Llanos). Also the uncontrolled growth envisages hotel 
developments for the municipalities of Catazajá, Chilón, Ocosingo, Salto del Agua, Palenque and Tumbalá.
“The government will build hotels here, golf courses,” says Domingo, “… our thinking is that later on, as indigenous, we will not have access. It will be tourists, though not just any tourists, only those who have a lot of money, and the hotel owners who have this.”
Bachajón. Dispossession is death. Life is resistance.
Watch on YouTube for English subtitles: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qJkVziBk214
–
On February 12 Velasco and Peña Nieto inaugurated Palenque airport, which became operational on March 13. According to a note in Proceso magazine, entitled Yesterday in Palenque the EMP threw out petitions from indigenous to EPN, indigenous inhabitants wanted to deliver petitions to the governors, but they were ignored.
The ejidatarios of Bachajón who we spoke with do not consider it necessary to build large tourist complexes. They explain that people come anyway to the waterfalls and ruins and to visit the rivers, especially the Tulijá where sport is practiced and crafts are sold.
They ask for nothing from the government, most of them do not receive support from government programmes. They have their cornfield, which they harvest twice a year. They plant it, clean it and at the right time bend the stalks and begin to pick it to take home and keep.
“Here it rains all year round. We do not burn, it is natural pasture which stays as fertilizer,” says Jerónimo Aguilar,” so we work here on the Mother Earth.”
“Everything is beautiful, this is why the government likes it: because there is water, there is forest, there are beautiful stones, so the government wants it, so it interests them very much, because everything here is natural. Wherever you go they want it,” accuses the ejidatario Ediberto Guzmán.
“This is the reason for this struggle, because if they harm the birds, the animals, there will be nowhere to live,” says Domingo, “the wind that blows through is natural. It is not contaminated. With this construction pollution, machinery will come.”
“We defend it as indigenous and so they want to remove us and take us elsewhere. The indigenous are accustomed to living on their land, where their grandparents lived.”
History of death
In 2011, 117 prisoners were all taken at the same time to the Prosecutor in Palenque. They had already arrested four, accused of assault and robbery with violence. Ten out of the 117 remained in the prison at Catazajá beaches. Five months later the last five were released.
The adherents to the Sixth from Bachajón have had, during their movement, about 150 prisoners. And two assassinations.
The ejido of Bachajón is the largest in Chiapas. It was founded in 1980, and belongs to the municipality of Chilón. You have to cross it to reach the municipality of Tumbalá, where the waterfalls are situated.
“Our grandparents legalized the ejido with a file and a certificate of land rights, but the officialists gave the the ejido to the government,” saysDomingo.
The Sixth of Bachajón was born on March 19, 2007 with the confirmation of alternative authorities to those chosen by the then ejidatarios, who were close to the political parties. Today the same situation continues, and the Agrarian Prosecutor from Ocosingo considers as authorities Pedro Álvaro Hernández and Pascual Pérez Álvaro, as ejidal commissioner and security commissioner respectively. Both are close to the official government, according to the adherents of the Sixth.
Later that same year [2007], the adherents decided to put a tollbooth in their territory where tourists would pay to visit the Agua Azul waterfalls. It was decided in assembly what to do with the money. Mainly, they say, it was used for the sick, and to support families in need.
In 2009 they were evicted; they reclaimed the booth, but on February 2, 2011, they were thrown out, violently, by police and shock groups affiliated to political parties.
On 24th April 2013, they murdered Juan Vázquez Guzmán, an activist and farmer who in 2010 was the Secretary General of the Sixth in Bachajón; when more than a hundred people were imprisoned, he visited them all in the different prisons.
On December 24, 2011, Juan Vázquez was arrested without a warrant by the local police of Chilón at the request of then Ejidal Commissioner Francisco Guzman Jiménez, and taken to the state prison in Ocosingo, Chiapas. Hours later he was released. On March 22, 2012, he was threatened with death by the same ejidal commissioner.
Among the prisoners he visited were Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Demeza Jiménez, both unjustly detained and tortured by the police to force them to plead guilty, with sentences of two years four months and three years two months (respectively); their people conducted an intensive campaign to free them similar to the campaign for the liberation of the indigenous Tzotzil professor Alberto Patishtan.
On March 21, Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano was killed with over twenty gunshots. He was travelling to the community of Virgen de Dolores, founded by the adherents to the Sixth in 2010. Juan Carlos served as regional coordinator for the Sixth in Bachajón, a position which Juan Vázquez Guzmán previously occupied.
Next to the tomb of Juan Vázquez (June 25, 1980 – April 24, 2013) is a smaller tomb. It is that of his nephew, who died at the age of ten months.
Death in Chiapas has different forms: the infant mortality rate is 75 per thousand children, it is the state with the second most malnutrition in the country, 71% of the indigenous population suffers from this; the state lives in a crisis of justice, its prisons hold prisoners who are innocent of the crime they are accused of – as in the case of the Tzotzil Alejandro Diaz Sántiz, also an adherent to the Sixth -; badly planned mining and tourism projects affect the environment and communities; the army (in Xanil) and groups affiliated to political parties who are responsible for violent attacks maintain a constant presence.
“What the government does is send people to jail or order their killing like Juan Vázquez Guzmán,” says Marcelo Mariano López, also an ejidatario, “Our struggle is not for economic or political power. It is for the people, the mother earth and the territory.”
A seed which sprouts
Juan Vázquez’s tomb is surrounded by lime, orange and tangerine trees. In his room there are photos of him with Bishop Raúl Vera in the Fray Bartomolé de las Casas Human Rights Centre. Everyone speaks of Juan in the present tense. “Juan loves his people”, “Juan is a farmer,” as if Juan is still alive.
“Juan for us is a seed which sprouts,” says Domingo; “we are never going to lose the fight because if we did, what would be the point of all the time that Juan spent in front of the people. Juan lives, so the Bachajón struggle continues”.
Antonio Estrada Estrada, recently liberated – in December 2013 – is sitting with his son, surrounded by his father, mother and brothers. He shows a corn cob and smiles. The marks of torture he suffered during his arrest show on his face.
Antonio Estrada Estrada
“Very happy because of being with your family. Being free to run and walk wherever you want.”
He is 26, but says: “I’ll keep fighting, I will carry on until I die, I will continue to defend what is ours, what belonged to our grandparents: the territory.”
Antonio (right) with his father
–
Miguel Demeza, who was also released in December, says:
“We are indigenous. We work in the fields and we have the right to participate in an organization and to defend our land, but the government does not like this. It was not just to serve a prison sentence for something I never committed. I will continue to fight against the injustice which exists in the state of Chiapas. The injustice which exists in my community.”
Miguel in the office on reclaimed land
He says all this while being interviewed in the office of the adherents to the Sixth which they call Nah Choj (where the tiger lives). It is on land reclaimed since 1994. Today they have a popular communication project, workshops and a committee of Human Rights, and a gravel pit called Nah Chawuk (where the lightning lives). Men watch the clouds and children play football on the patio of their offices. There is a painting of Zapata on the wall and the women prepare tostadas. On the wall there is a poster with a blue waterfall. Next to it, the face of Juan Vázquez Guzmán.
Sign in the gravel quarry
Text: Aldabi Olvera. Photos: Eduardo Velasco, Alfonso Flores, Ignacio Martínez and Erika Lozano. Video: Eduardo Velasco.
http://www.masde131.com/2014/03/de-muerte-y-vida-en-las-cascadas-de-agua-azul/
******************************************************************************
Tzeltales of Bachajón, against the co-optation of ejido authorities
Ejido members defending their territory seek the removal of the official authorities, who are playing dirty tricks in order to hand over land to tourism megaprojects
Ricardo Lagunes Gasca
Desinformémonos, 23 March, 2014
Mexico. “The bad government wants to finish us off completely, they are killing our friends”, denounce the ejido members of San Sebastan Bachajón. Juan Carlos Gomez Silvano, regional coordinator of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle for the San Sebastian Bachajón ejido, was assassinated, hit by more than 20 high-power gunshots. The Chiapas state authorities are seeking to downplay his murder as an act of inter-community conflict, but what is really happening in Bachajón is a struggle for the defence of the land worked by the ejido members who support the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, against the government supporters’ plans for the implementation of large-scale tourism projects.
In January and March of 2014, the supporters of the Sixth Declaration publicly denounced the fact that the commissioner Alejandro Moreno and security agent Samuel Díaz are seeking to obtain – using deception – a copy of the certificates of agricultural rights of the ejido members, supposedly with the intention to develop a government coffee project, when in reality these documents will be used to fake support for an Act of the General Assembly of Ejido Members, in which the annulment of the amparo (injunction) 274/2011 of the Seventh District Court in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas (the result of a case brought by the adherents of the Sixth Declaration in March 2011 for defence of their territory), will be requested.
Since 2012, these ejido members have independently taken responsibility for the defence of their territory, demanding justice for the assassination of several of their ejido authorities, and the release of the political prisoners who come from the area.
In response to this fraudulent act on the part of the official ejido authorities, on the 5th of February of 2014, the supporters of the Sixth Declaration demanded, before the Unitary Agricultural Tribunal in Comitán, the annulment of the appointment of the commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gomez, and the remaining members of the official board, for their failure to act in accordance with the Agrarian Law and the usos y costumbres (traditional laws) of the community. They also requested the surrender of accounts and the balance sheets of income and expenditure of ex-ejido commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez for the period 2010-2013. The demand was upheld by the Agrarian Trbunal and a date was set for the 25th of March, 2014 for an appearance before the Audience of Law, which the community authorities involved will be obliged to attend.
With repression and impunity, the State is seeking a way to establish dispossession and privatization of indigenous territories. This strategy of physical and psychological violence is also accompanied by the usual social anti-poverty programs, used to divide the population and disincentivise community organization – combined with the co-optation of community authorities, who ensure that land is handed over for the implementation of large-scale projects, designed by international private corporations or organizations.
This is an integral part of the strategy of dispossession of indigenous peoples. It is for this reason that the State seeks to distract public opinion from the fundamental issue, which is the repossession of land and natural resources, reducing all local violence associated with this process to mere intra/intercommunity conflict.
Juan Vázquez, living memory
This April will mark the one-year anniversary of the politically-motivated murder of the community leader, and human rights advocate, Juan Vazquez Guzman, his life stolen from him by firearm shots on the night of the 24th of April, 2013, in the Bachajón village, in the municipality of Chilón, Chiapas, while he was resting inside his house, with his two sons, both minors.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán struggled tirelessly to defend the dignity of his people, and he denounced at both a national and international level the government corruption that sought the appropriation, whatever the cost, of the lands of the San Sebastian Bachajón ejido. This would allow state and private interests to acquire greater political and social control, so that they might be able to implement, without opposition, the tourism megaproject in the neighbouring village of Agua Azul, in the municipality of Tumbalá.
Until now, the legal proceedings launched by the State that were charged with shedding light on the murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán have only managed to ensure impunity for the crime. An unequivocal sign of this is the lack of progress in the investigations, and the underlying fact that the entity responsible for them, the District Attorney for Indigenous Justice in Bachajón, lacks even the most basic resources necessary to carry out a serious, exhaustive investigation.
Despite the displacement currently occurring under police and military occupation, and the murder and incarceration of their members, the Tzeltales of the San Sebastian Bachajón ejido – supporters of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle – are staying organized, willing to continue struggling for their rights and to maintain alive the memory of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, as a true act of justice and symbol of the value of their work at the service of the people.
In September 2013, the Tzeltales presented an example of this, in founding the Nah Chawuk gravel bank on their territory, with the objective to break with the monopoly of the principal gravel bank of the San Sebastian Bachajón ejido, which is administrated by the official ejido authorities – who do not permit fair and equitable access to natural resources to the ejido members, instead providing exclusive access for private businesses and particular interests.
After the founding of Nah Chawuk, the supporters of the Sixth Declaration suffered threats of displacement from the official ejido commissioner, Alejandro Moreno Gómez, and from the head of security Samuel Diaz Guzmán. This pair, unbeknownst to the General Assembly of Ejido Workers, tried to encourage their displacement by groups aligned to the Green Ecological Party and the Institutional Revolutionary Party. This is the same modus operandi used by the ex-ejido commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez during the events of the 2nd of February, 2011, when a violent displacement took place from the common lands through which the path to the Agua Azul Waterfalls Ecotourism Centre traverses. This time, the threat of displacement failed to achieve its goal, and the adherents of the Sixth Declaration maintain the gravel bank under their protection.
In December 2013, the adherents of the Sixth Declaration from San Sebastian Bachajón won the release of Miguel Demeza Jiménez and Antonio Estrada Estrada, unjustly held prisoner since October, 2010, and August, 2011, respectively.
Miguel Demeza regained his liberty outright; nonetheless, Antonio Estrada continues to be subject to a federal penal process before the Sixth District Court of Tuxtla Gutiérrez, despite the fact that the evidence with which he was accused was declared inadmissable by the Third Collegiate Tribunal of the Twentieth Circuit on resolving his lawsuit 915/2013. Until his legal situation is resolved, Antonio has to travel every fifteen days from his community to the city of Tuxtla Gutiérrez to sign a control register for defendants.
The Tzeltal Bachajón adherents of the Sixth Declaration recognise that the release of Miguel and Antonio is the fruit of the struggle of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and that of national and international solidarity, who were a watchful presence throughout his incarceration.
Faced with this situation, the Tzeltales of San Sebastián Bachajón who support the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle continue to stand out as an example of dignity and resistance. Continuously, they are confronted firsthand with the imposition of the whims of capitalism, as the the veil over the economic and political interests provoking community conflict for the sole purpose of appropriating land is removed.
Translated by Andrew Green
http://desinformemonos.org/2014/03/tseltales-de-bachajon-contra-la-cooptacion-de-autoridades-ejidales/
********************************************************************
Communiqué from the Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón on the assassination of Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano
FROM THE EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 23 MARCH 2014
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To the people of Mexico and the world
Compañeros and compañeras in struggle, on Friday March 21, 2014, at around 9 am, our compañero Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano was ambushed and cruelly assassinated with over twenty shots from a high calibre firearm, while he was driving his small truck with passenger seats up to the San José Chapapuyil crossroads in the direction of the Autonomous Community Virgen de Dolores, founded by our organization in 2010.
At the time of his murder, Juan Carlos was 22 years old, held the post of regional Coordinator of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle for the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón and was the father of a baby aged six months.
Municipal police from Chilón and preventive state police arrived at the crime scene and began taking photos and video of the body of our compañero without respect for the deceased and his family. The public ministry of Chilón said the body of our compañero would be taken away for an autopsy, but we did not allow it, because this is our custom, and we took him to rest at Virgen de Dolores community so we could pray for him.
Since we founded the communities of Nah Choj and Virgen de Dolores in 2010, our organization has been harassed at various times by the army and state preventive police, threatening us with eviction because of pressures from those who say they are the owners of the property, among them a former municipal president of Chilón, fomenting division and buying the consciences of some ex compañeros with their crumbs, like they did with Carmen Aguilar Gómez and his son of the same name who, when he sold out to Noé Castañón León, the Secretary of Government of Juan Sabines Guerrero, organized for the eviction of our ticket booth on February 2, 2011 and dispossessed us of our lands in complicity with the ex ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón Francisco Guzmán Jiménez (alias el goyito).
The bad government wants to finish us off completely by assassinating our compañeros, like they did with Juan Vázquez Guzmán on April 24, 2013, using their paramilitary gunmen, who with complete impunity, whether by night or in the full light of day, are capable of vilely murdering our compañeros who are working and struggling to construct a world in which other worlds fit, and who are daily resisting the attacks of the capitalist system which wants to make us disappear so they can take over our mother earth, water, rivers, waterfalls and all that will serve to make them more money at the cost of our lives and suffering.
The real criminals, assassins and corrupt ones are the party politicians who, despite reaching their position through fraud and buying votes, consider that they are the owners of all that exists in our lands. Every day they want to get richer and it doesn’t matter how many indigenous they have to kill to achieve this. Like the current mayor of Chilón, Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, a member of the Green Ecologist Party, and one of the authors of the dispossession of our lands, because he financed the weapons of the group led by Carmen Aguilar Gómez the elder, Juan Alvaro Gómez and Manuel Jiménez who evicted our compañeros from the ticket booth in February 2011.
Our organization has had the dignity to continue standing in struggle and defending our people although we have had many compañeros imprisoned or murdered; we are not afraid because we are on the path that our grandparents followed, our ancestors have given us the wisdom to read the signs of life and of the times; the bad governments come and go, but we the peoples who have resisted are still standing here in struggle and will continue whatever the cost.
One day our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán told us well that our struggle is for the life of our people and because we want to continue being what we are. A few weeks before the first anniversary of the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, the bad government sends its killers to hurt the Virgen de Dolores community; it was born with great effort and sacrifice, and now the cornfields and the fruits of the good mother earth grow there to feed our children. Compañero Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano is part of the foundation and construction of autonomy in the Virgen de Dolores community, his participation and his work for the organization and the community will never be forgotten because we carry it in our hearts.
Manuel Velasco Coello and Enrique Peña Nieto are wrong if they think that they are going to finish us off with violence and repression, our organization is ready to resist and to continue building the autonomy which has been denied in law and in action to the indigenous communities.
We salute all the expressions of solidarity and support for our struggle from organizations nationally and internationally. The men and women of San Sebastián Bachajón want to say that we are also aware of your word and your struggle, from our geography we have our fists raised in solidarity with you.
From the northern zone of Chiapas, receive a combative embrace.
Never again a Mexico without us
Attentively
Land and Freedom!
Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vazquez Guzman Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
***********************************************************************
Message of Support to the Ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón
To the family of Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano
To the Ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón
To our comrades and adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle
To members of the mass and alternative media
To the Good Government
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the National Indigenous Congress
To the Network against Repression and for Solidarity
To the Movement of Justice for the District of New York
To the defenders of national and international human rights
To the people of Mexico and the world
Even at the bottom of the world in New Zealand we have heard the terrible news of the shooting death of our comrade Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano on Friday March 21, 2014 after he was ambushed at the San Jose Chapapuyil crossroad while driving his truck towards the Autonomous Community of Virgen de Dolores, of which he was a founder.
We know that at the time of his murder, Juan Carlos was 22 years old, held the post of Regional Coordinator for the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón for the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, and was the father of a six month old baby.
We in New Zealand deplore this cold-blooded assassination, and note that it is yet another example of the sustained campaign of harrassment and murder waged by the army and state preventive police in collusion with corrupt ejido officials Alejandro Moreno Gómez and Samuel Diaz Guzman, and ex-Ejido Commissioner Francisco Guzman Jimenez against the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón, designed to create division within the community and drive the ejido members of the Sixth from their lands.
Two more examples of the growing list of crimes against them are the eviction from their toll booth on February 2, 2011 and the murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán on April 24, 2013.
We express our deepest sympathy and condolences to the family of Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, and raise our fists in solidarity with the men and women of San Sebastián Bachajón and their struggle.
Receive an ‘abrazo combativo’ from us at the bottom of the world.
Sincerely
Wellington Zapatista Support Group, New Zealand
Land and Freedom!
Zapata Lives!
Until victory always!
Political prisoners! Freedom!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No to dispossession of indigenous territories!
*******************************************************************
The Assassination of the pro-Zapatista leader is proof that “the government wants to finish us off,” they accuse
** The indigenous say that the Army relentlessly harasses residents of Nah Choj and Virgen de Dolores
** They want to dispossess us of our lands through the actions of paramilitary groups, they assert
By: Hermann Bellinghausen, Envoy
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, March 23, 2014
Last Friday the 21st, at approximately 9 o’clock in the morning, the young Tzeltal, Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, was ambushed and murdered. He received more than 20 high-calibre shots while he was driving his small truck with passenger seats, at the San José Chapapuyil crossing, in the direction of the Virgen de Dolores autonomous community, which was founded in 2010 on lands recuperated by campesinos adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle.
Juan Carlos, 22, was the regional coordinator of the Sixth for the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido and the father of a six-month old baby, reported the ejido owners, meeting together today in Ocosingo to issue the denunciation. Chilón municipal police and state preventive police arrived at the crime scene, taking photos and video “without respect for the deceased and his family.” The Chilón Public Ministry said that the body would be taken away to perform an autopsy, “but we did not allow it, because this is our custom, and we took him to rest at Virgen de Dolores community so we could pray for him,” the indigenous explained.
Ever since they founded the communities of Nah Choj and Virgen de Dolores in 2010, “the Army and the state police have harassed our organization, threatening it with eviction because of pressures from those who say they are owners of the property, a former municipal president among them.”
The government strategy has been to foment “division and buy the consciences of some ex compañeros with its crumbs, like it did with Carmen Aguilar Gómez and his son of the same name who, when he sold out to Noé Castañón León, the Secretary of Government of Juan Sabines Guerrero, organized for the eviction of our ticket booth on February 2, 2011 and dispossessed us of our lands in complicity with the ex ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez.”
The government, they maintained, “wants to finish us off completely by assassinating our compañeros, like it did with Juan Vázquez Guzmán on April 24, 2013, using its paramilitary gunmen, who with complete impunity, be it by night or in the full light of day, are capable of vilely murdering our compañeros who work and struggle to construct a world in which other worlds fit.” Gómez Silvano, for his part, participated in the foundation and the construction of autonomy in Virgen de Dolores.
“The real criminals, assassins and corrupt ones are the party politicians who, despite reaching their position through fraud and buying votes, consider that they are the owners of all that exists in our lands. Every day they want to get richer and it doesn’t matter how many indigenous they have to kill to achieve this.”
The complainants emphasized that the current mayor of Chilón, Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, “a member of the Green Ecologist Party,” is “one of the authors of the dispossession of our lands, because he financed the weapons of the group that evicted our compañeros from the ticket booth in February 2011,” at the access to the Agua Azul Cascades.
The organization of the Sixth “has had the dignity to continue struggling” despite many of them having been imprisoned or murdered. “We are not afraid because we are on the path that our grandparents followed. Our ancestors have given us the wisdom to read the signs of life and of the times. The bad governments come and go, but the peoples who have resisted still stand here struggling.”
A few weeks before the first anniversary of the assassination of Vázquez Guzmán, the ejido owners add, “the bad government sends its killers to injure the Virgen de Dolores community, which was born with great effort and sacrifice” and now milpas and fruit trees grow there “to feed our children.”
The ejido owners of the Sixth conclude that: “Manuel Velasco Coello and Enrique Peña Nieto are wrong if they think that they are going to finish us off with violence and repression.”
———————————————————–
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Monday, March 24, 2014
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2014/03/24/politica/018n1pol
***********************************************************************
Young indigenous leader assassinated in Chilón, Chiapas
**Accounts say he was shot 20 times
Hermann Bellinghausen
La Jornada
Sunday March 23, 2014
San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas, March 22
–
–
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, from the municipality of Chilón, was assassinated on Friday on a dirt road in this same location. According to reports picked up by La Jornada, the indigenous man received at least 20 shots.
Koman Ilel, an alternative media from this city, said Silvano Gómez, a Tzeltal campesino aged 21, “participated in the construction of autonomy on the land recuperated from the predio Virgen de Dolores” in the municipality, and was regional coordinator of the Sixth Declaration, convoked by the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN). His community is organized in resistance with the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón.
According to the local press, Silvano Gómez was allegedly traveling alone in a small Nissan farm truck. His body was found at the Chapapujil crossing near the municipal capital of Chilón. According to “unofficial” reports from the judicial authorities of the state, the agent of the Public Ministry Octavio Bautista Martinez arrived at the scene to take away the body of the young indigenous leader, but a large group of “hooded men” had taken it away “for burial”.
Meanwhile, Koman Ilel recalls that, less than a year ago, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, leader of the Sixth of San Sebastián Bachajón was executed, also in the municipality of Chilón. “Why do they kill them?” asks the informative note, and it states that the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón “has for years kept up a strong struggle against the dispossession of their territory.”
It points out that “different actors, including local, state and federal governments, transnational corporations (Norton Consulting) and paramilitary groups are promoting legal and illegal strategies to carry out one of the most ambitious projects in the region, part of Plan Puebla -Panama: the Palenque Integrally Planned Centre, a network of infrastructure and services that seeks to join together natural and archaeological attractions for an elite tourism,” transforming the indigenous population “into sevants” in their own communities.
One of the government strategies to ensure territorial control, adds the information from Koman Ilel, “has been the co-optation or intimidation of the ejidal authorities, as well as legal persecution and selective assassinations of those who are opposed to being dispossessed, as is the case with compañeros Juan Carlos Silvano Gómez and Juan Vázquez Guzmán.”
Chilón is currently governed, like Chiapas itself, by the Green Party of Mexico. The authorities have been complicit or remiss, at the very least, faced with the aggressions suffered systematically by the ejidatarios in resistance. The mayor Rafael Guirao Aguilar, certainly, also presides over the state’s Green Chiapas Foundation, which supports his fellow party member, the Governor Manuel Velasco Coello.
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2014/03/23/index.php?section=politica&article=017n1pol
–
*********************************************************************
Assassination of Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, from the Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, Adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, Chiapas
They, those from above, think they know how to damage our rebellion, they are almost certain that by ravaging our compañerxs, tearing up their bodies, they will spread fear and terror and we will stop fighting. We, those from below, we think that dignity, strength, and fighting in the defence of the reproduction of life have deep roots, and cannot be finished off with bullets because the body is something other, it is a collective body, remembering our dead not with nostalgia but by naming them when walking in confrontation against the bad government and the economic groups who exploit, dispossess, despise and repress us.
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano was killed yesterday, March 21st, in the official municipality of Chilón in the state of Chiapas, trying to stain the spring with blood. They pierced his body with more than twenty bullets of power, bullets of profit, bullets of deception, the bullets of the war against the people which does not end. But they have not killed his history of struggle.
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano, 21 years old, participated in the construction of autonomy in the recuperated land of the predio [ranch] Virgen de Dolores in Chilón, he did this from the dignified struggle of Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the LacandónJungle EZLN, of which he was regional coordinator.
Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano was slaughtered just one month before the first anniversary of the murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, also an ejidatario and activist from San Sebastián Bachajón.
Why kill them?
Located in the north east of Chiapas, the Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle of the EZLN, has maintained for many years a strong fight against the dispossession of its territory. Various actors, including the municipal, state and federal governments, transnational corporations (Norton Consulting) and even paramilitary groups (OPDDIC) are promoting legal and illegal strategies to carry out what would be one of the most ambitious projects in the region, one which is part of Plan Puebla Panama: the Palenque CIP (Integrally Planned Centre), a network of infrastructure and services through which it seeks to combine the natural and archaeological attractions for an elite tourism, forcing its inhabitants into neo-colonial bondage in their own communities.
In this context, one of the strategies used to ensure territorial control has been the co-optation and/or intimidation of the ejidal authorities and the judicial prosecution and selective assassination of those who are opposed to being dispossessed, as is the case of the compañeros Juan Carlos Gómez Silvano and Juan Vázquez Guzmán.
For the rest of the world, the struggle of the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón is a mirror of learning to look at the Horror of the war which affects all of us and every one of our territories, but also to look at the Resistance which grows and widens faced with the impossibility of living without struggling.
At the time of the publication of this note an official statement from the compañerxs of the Ejido San Sebastian Bachajón is still awaited; this will surely elaborate on what we know so far.
by Rene Olvera
San Cristobal de Las Casas Chiapas,
March 21, 2014
**********************************************************************
They denounce that the ejido authorities in Chilón, Chiapas, were elected with forged signatures
** The ejido owners present a complaint to the Unitary Agrarian Tribunal in Comitán
** In the record of the proceedings of the respective assembly, signatures appear of persons who have already died, they point out
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
Tzeltal ejido owners, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle from San Sebastián Bachajón ejido, in Chilón, Chiapas, presented a complaint to the Unitary Agrarian Tribunal (TUA, its initials in Spanish) of Comitán de Domínguez, against the record of assembly proceedings by means of which ejido authorities were illegally designated, and in contravention of international treaties in matters of indigenous peoples.
This record, according to the ejido owners, presents falsified signatures, because among the signers there are persons who have already died and others others who did not even participate in the assembly.
The indigenous people initiated legal action against the officialist (pro-government) ejido authorities, for the purpose of defending their territory, reports the lawyer Ricardo Lagunes Gasca, who shows the admission agreement for the agrarian complaint presented, whose case number is 29/2014, in the TUA of District 54 in Comitán.
Last February 5, the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido owners challenged the designation of Alejandro Moreno Gómez, Antonio Luna Hernández and Gerónimo Gómez Pérez as president, secretary and treasurer of the ejido commission.
At the same time, the ejido owners and adherents to the Sixth complained to the Agrarian Tribunal: “the rendition of accounts and the balance of each and every one of the income and expenses during the period that Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, Miguel Moreno Jiménez and Jacinto Álvaro Gómez occupied the same positions, since as of this date and despite having left the position, they have not complied with this obligation that the Agrarian Law mandates and with the uses and customs of the indigenous community.”
The state government’s direct intervention in internal matters of the ejido and its different villages has gone on for several years. It has provoked violence against those who peacefully defend their territory, painful divisions and incarcerations under false charges. Less than one year ago, one of the principal leaders of the resistance, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, was murdered.
As La Jornada reported on February 7, the complaint filed by the Tzeltals of Bachajón was admitted by the TUA in Comitán, and it has issued a summons to the officialist ejido authorities of San Sebastián Bachajón “to answer the complaint and be present before this organ of jurisdiction on March 25 for the purpose of showing what corresponds to their right.”
The legal representative of the ejido owners points out that: “on countless occasions they have denounced the corruption of the officialist (pro-government) authorities of their ejido, for their participation in the delivery of an area of common use lands” to the federal and state governments, “for the implementation of a tourist megaproject designed for transnational corporations, within the Mesoamerican regional plan and the Palenque Integrally Planned Centre.” With their legal action, he concludes, “the adherents to the Sixth exercise an integral defence of their territory.”
———————————————————-
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Saturday, March 8, 2014
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2014/03/08/politica/017n1pol
English translation by the Chiapas Support Committee for the International Zapatista Translation Service
*******************************************************
Ejidal Commissioner of Bachajón deceives Tzeltales in order to dispossess them of their lands
They denounce that with false promises he is collecting signatures to simulate an assembly
Hermann Bellinghausen
La Jornada
Thursday March 6, 2014
Tzeltal ejidatarios from San Sebastián Bachajón in Chilón, Chiapas, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, denounced the illegal manoeuvres by the ejidal commissioner to formalize the dispossession of communal territory for tourist purposes, something which the ejidatarios have struggled against for several years.
The indigenous said that this officialist commissioner, Alejandro Moreno Gómez, “continues to deceive with false promises the people of the community of San Sebastián Bachajón, because he asked for their signature and a copy of the certificate of land rights in exchange for crumbs, saying he is going to get a government coffee project, but this is a lie because he is only gathering the list of signatures and the land documents in order to fabricate minutes of the ejidal assembly and ask the Seventh District Court in Tuxtla Gutierrez to cancel our amparo 274/2011, which yesterday, 3 March, completed 3 years in operation and the bad government could not bring it down due to the organization of our people.”
Moreno Gómez and his Chairman of the Vigilance Commission, Samuel Diaz Guzman, “tried to simulate that an act of the general assembly of ejidatarios had been made, but this is not true, because they are doing it in secret, out of sight of the people, like true criminals,” added the ejidatarios of the Sixth.
“Our organization will not allow the ejidal authorities to continue, along with the bad government, dispossessing our people. Since 2007 the bad government has intervened in the internal life of our community to impose ejidal representatives as they please, who serve them as if they were their minions to defend the interests of the capitalists and not those of the indigenous people.” They note that Moreno Gómez “does not know his people, because he has lived for a long time outside [the community], he is only interested in filling his bags of money for himself, this is why it suits the bad government to have him as Commissioner, because they can manipulate him as they like, and this is why they imposed him.”
The ejidatarios disclosed that, last February 5, they challenged the minutes of the assembly held on April 18, 2013 to elect the organs of representation of the ejido, in which Alejandro Moreno Gómez “was imposed” by representatives of the government of the State of Chiapas and the Agrarian Prosecutor from Ocosingo. “There are irregularities such as the forging of the signatures of the ejidatarios, and non-compliance with the requirements of agrarian law,” as well as the “lack of accountability” of the former ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez (aka the Goyito).
The indigenous of the Sixth concluded: “These false representatives are accomplices of the bad government, they dispossess their people and seek to repress our organization through imprisonment and death.” They do not say this figuratively. Several of them have been imprisoned (the last two were released less than three months ago). Last April, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, leader of the resistance, was executed on the doorstep of his home in Bachajón; the crime remains unpunished, and the judicial authorities do not even pretend to investigate the case.
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2014/03/06/index.php?section=politica&article=021n1pol
************************************************************************
Communiqué from San Sebastián Bachajón, 4 March 2014.
FROM THE EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 4 MARCH 2014
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To public opinion
Compañeros and compañeras who struggle for a world where many worlds fit, we share our word of the true women and men of the community of San Sebastián Bachajón who are organized as adherents to the sixth declaration of the lacandón jungle in defence of our territory.
We denounce that the officialist ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez is continuing to deceive the people of the community of San Sebastián Bachajón with false promises because he asked for their signature and a copy of the certificate of land rights in exchange for crumbs saying he is going to get a government coffee project, but this is a lie because he is only gathering the list of signatures and the land documents in order to fabricate minutes of the ejidal assembly and ask the Seventh District Court in Tuxtla Gutierrez to cancel our amparo 274/2011, which yesterday, 3 March, completed 3 years in operation and the bad government could not bring it down due to the organization of our people.
This Alejandro Moreno Gómez and his Chairman of the Vigilance Commission, Samuel Diaz Guzman, tried to simulate that an act of the general assembly of ejidatarios had been made, but we make clear that this is not true, because they are doing it in secret, out of sight of the people, like true criminals.
Our organization will not allow the ejidal authorities to continue, along with the bad government, dispossessing our people. Since 2007 the bad government has intervened in the internal life of our community to impose ejidal representatives as they please, who serve them as if they were their minions to defend the interests of the capitalists and not those of the indigenous people. Alejandro Moreno Gómez does not know his people, because he has lived for a long time outside the community, he does not know the needs of San Sebastián Bachajón, he is only interested in filling his bags of money for himself, this is why it suits the bad government to have him as Commissioner, because they can manipulate him as they like, and this is why they imposed him.
We inform you that on February 5 2014 our organization challenged the minutes of the assembly held on April 18, 2013 to elect the organs of representation of the ejido, in which Alejandro Moreno Gómez was imposed by representatives of the government of the State of Chiapas and the Agrarian Prosecutor from Ocosingo, because there are irregularities such as the forging of the signatures of the ejidatarios, and non-compliance with the requirements of agrarian law, also the lack of accountability of the former ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzman Jimenez (aka the Goyito). These false representatives are accomplices of the bad government, they dispossess their people and seek to suppress our organization through imprisonment and death.
We greet the organizations in struggle and resistance against the projects of dispossession of the bad governments and businesses. We ask all the compañeros and compañeras and national and international solidarity organisations to remain alert as to what is happening in our community.
Never again a Mexico without us.
From the north of Chiapas, receive an embrace from the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón.
Attentively
Land and Freedom!
Zapata Vive!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for political prisoners!
Juan Vazquez Guzman Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No dispossession of indigenous territories!
******************************************************************************
Prisoners released; the Bachajón struggle continues!
By Manu Tension
The prison is one of the worst hells that a human being can live; it is one of the weapons that the capitalist system uses to intimidate and force to conform those that protest, defend their rights, resist and construct. Prison is one of the worst nightmares in existence, above all when the person incarcerated turns out to be innocent; and everyone knows that person to be innocent because they know the real motive by which they stand accused of their crimes; and it seems that the only person to be unaware of this is the judge who sentences the innocent to spend years in jail.
Working Group No Estamos Todxs [1]
***
On the 24th of December 2013, Antonio Estrada Estrada, an indigenous Tzeltal and adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, was finally freed from prison after more than two years of incarceration. He followed Miguel Demeza Jiménez (freed on 21st December, 2013) and Miguel Vázquez Deara (the 26thJune, 2013) in being released this year. The latter pair are inhabitants of the ejido community of San Sebastian Bachajón, and were being held unjustly in prisons in Chiapas in the context of their struggle for the defence of ejido (that is, collectively owned and worked) territory and against the plunder of their natural resources. Even if the ejido no longer counts political prisoners among its number, it continues to resist in the context of a war that seeks to finish their community, and their way of life, for good.
The case: “A legal farce and a set-up” (Lagunes)
On the evening of the 27th of December, in the Cultural Space “El Paliacate” in San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Antonio arrived with his lawyer, Ricardo Arturo Lagunes, to give a press conference. The two men told those present about the series of events that had occurred since Antonio’s detention, on the 7th of August, 2011. They related how Antonio Estrada was apprehended that day upon leaving his house – without an arrest warrant or ministerial order – to then be taken to Palenque. Disappeared and denied all contact with the outside world for more than 24 hours, he was subject to torture that left him with a broken nose and a fractured rib. The attacks occurred in the offices of the local government administration, before he was later transferred to Ocosingo.
The following day, on the 8th of August, 2011, they moved him again, this time to a location close to the gravel bank at Bachajón. It was there that six police officers were involved in fabricating his crime, creating the scene of an attack where he had supposedly been caught red-handed and arrested for “assault, organized crime and carrying weapons only permitted for Army use”. Soon afterwards, they tortured a confession out of him. Antonio Estrada was sentenced to 7 years in prison.
This is just one example of the persecution that the inhabitants of San Sebastián Bachajón have suffered since 2011, on the part of the official ejido authorities and municipal, state and federal governments. This ejido is one of the biggest in the country; it can count on more than 4,000 members and an impressive biodiversity, with much flora and fauna. It is worth emphasising that it is also located very close to the Agua Azul waterfalls, which the government is seeking to convert into a global tourist attraction; the zone has thus pricked the interests of both national and international businesses, creating conflict over the ownership of these territories that are so rich in natural resources.
Terrority as plunder of war
During the press conference, Antonio Estrada Estrada and Ricardo Arturo Lagunes denounced Francisco Guzmán (ex-ejidal commissioner for the Institutional Revolutionary Party [PRI]), Juan Álvaro Moreno and Manuel Jiménez Moreno, as those responsible for the acts of violence that have taken place in the zone.
“They are the same people from the official party that have at other points participated in violent acts, such as the displacement of the toll booth at the Agua Azul waterfalls on the 2nd of February, 2011”, Lagunes said. In the aftermath of that act, police and military forces detained more than 100 members of the ejido, some of whom had to wait until June of that year to be released. After that, “the State decided to attack the organization selectively”, the lawyer told us. The imprisonment of Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Demeza Jiménez served as an example, creating scapegoats in the context of a broader strategy to sow fear in the community and silence social protest.
At the same time, the area was militarized and the state government of Juan Sabines, ex-governor of Chiapas, signed an agreement with the state-recognised ejido authorities that would see them hand over land to the state. Ceding to state interests, those co-opted authorities overrode the assembly, the principal authority of the ejido and transcendental historical figure of the indigenous peoples of Chiapas. In the words of Lagunes:
“This is the group that the State itself has empowered not only to imprison people, but to take over, illegally, the communal territories.”
All of these occurrences only confirm the State’s desire to erode the social fabric of the community and divide further the ejido, “encouraging an individualist environmentalism, demoralizing and dismantling [the ejido‘s] more collective and community-based structures”, Lagunes continues.
Faced with economic, psychological and social erosion, the cooptation of authorities, dispossession of communal territories and a brutal repression during which Juan Vázquez Guzman was killed in April 2013 [2], the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido has become a site of low-intensity warfare. Despite this, the ejido‘s inhabitants continue to resist and assert that the death of Guzman, rather than being the end of their movement, gave them yet another reason to keep on in the struggle.
Whilst Miguel Demeza Jimenez was absolved of all charges, Antonio was released on the basis that he remain technically guilty and retain a criminal record; this after having lodged a legal complaint before the legal authorities for the human rights abuses he suffered.
The struggle is not over
Lagunes emphasises that the release of these prisoners “is an important moment in the struggle of the San Sebastián Bachjón ejido, one which was achieved thanks to national and international solidarity”, and thanks the members of the Movement for Justice in El Barrio in New York, an organization adherent to the Sexta, who also sent a letter of solidarity which was read out during Estrada’s press conference. He also recognised many other collectives, free media and other organizations for their support.
The message is clear: the inhabitants of San Sebastián Bachajón remain resolute and strong in the struggle to defend their identity, their territory and observance of their fundamental rights as indigenous people; and they demand justice and an investigation into the intellectual and material authors of the killing of Juan Vasquez Guzmán, which has until now gone unpunished.
“Juan Vasquez Guzmán was always at the forefront of the people, and the ejido members. He was like a spokesperson for us, because there are only a few of us that speak a bit of Spanish, only a few of us that know how to read and write, because of that we are spokespeople. That’s why they sent people to kill him, simply for speaking out and defending our territory, Mother Earth and the natural resources that belong to the ejido.” [3]
Finally, they demand the release of Alejandro Díaz Santis – prisoner in CERESO no. 5 – with whom Antonio Estrada Estrada was able to talk shortly before the conference.
References:
- [1] Grupo de Trabajo No Estamos Todxs. “Denuncia de Antonio Estrada, preso político del ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas” (20th October 2013). pozol.org
- [2] José Aureliano Buendía / SubVersiones (3rd June 2013). “San Sebastián Bachajón, despojo y violencia del Estado mexicano”. subversiones.org
- [3] Domingo Pérez in an (unpublished) interview with SubVersiones (14th November 2013).
Audios of the press conference:
- Conferencia de prensa por la libertad de Antonio Estrada Estrada 27/12/2013. archive.org
- Conferencia de Prensa por la libertad de Miguel Demeza 24/12/2013. archive.org
More information:
- Viva Bachajón. vivabachajon.wordpress.com
- El ejido de San Sebastián Bachajón: la libertad de los presos políticos contra el despojo. komanilel.org
- Interview (in Spanish) with the compañeros of San Sebastián Bachajón. regeneracionradio.org
- Press Conference: Antonio Estrada Estrada is free (in Spanish). radiozapatista.org
- Resuelven amparo a favor de ejidatarios de Bachajón contra ocupación de tierras. jornada.unam.mx
http://subversiones.org/archivos/18050
–
********************************************************************
Ejidatarios Displaced from Chenalhó Suffer Threats when Harvesting their Coffee Fields
** Indigenous Tzeltal unjustly arrested and imprisoned receives amparo (protection order)
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, January 26th, 2014
Representatives of the displaced people from the ejido Puebla, in Chenalhó, who on Monday will complete 10 days harvesting the coffee fields which they left behind last August, announced that they will return to take refuge again in the Las Abejas camp in Acteal, where they have been staying for six months, because conditions for their definitive return still do not exist and the state government has not fulfilled the demands of the indigenous, Nicolás Cruz Pérez stated today.
“During the time we have been harvesting the coffee we have received threats and attacks, we have a list of these acts, and are letting the Public Prosecutor (who the government sent from January 17 to 27) know about the threats and attacks,” which are the same ones Governor Manuel Velasco Coello was told about “on his visit to our ejido on January 22,” added the indigenous, insisting on a “just and dignified” return.
The demands of the families, who were displaced by the violence of an officialist (pro-government) group from the community are: reparations for damages (robberies, damage to property and crops), restitution of the chapel annexed by the ejido authorities, and the application of the law to the numerous crimes committed by the officialist group.
During the time that they have stayed in the ejido, the displaced have received continual insults and threats of the same kind that dispossessed them of the chapel.
Antonio Estrada Estrada
In another matter, it was reported that the Tzeltal campesino Antonio Estrada Estrada, from San Sebastián Bachajón (Chilón), received an amparo (legal protection order) which opens the door to his final acquittal. Released from prison last December 24th, until now his freedom has not been complete.
The state government released Estrada, an adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, after he had been arrested illegally, tortured and unjustly deprived of his freedom for more than two years. When he left the prison at Playas de Catazajá the accusations of a federal crime, although unfounded, were still hanging over him. For this reason he still has to go periodically to sign in at a lower court in the state capital.
The lawyer Ricardo Lagunes Gasca, legal representative of the ejidatarios, explained that his liberation was through a benefit of law granted by the Chiapas government. However, “Antonio has not legally regained his innocence,” plus he also faces a federal trial before the sixth district judge in Tuxtla Gutiérrez. This trial derives from the same matter for which he was sentenced to more that seven years; now the charge is added of carrying a firearm for the exclusive use of the Army.
On Friday, 24th January, added the lawyer, “the third collegiate tribunal in Tuxtla Gutiérrez issued the decision in the case of the petition for amparo filed by Estrada in September 2013, challenging the sentence of more that seven years in prison delivered by the lower court judge of Playas de Catazajá, for the alleged crimes of armed robbery and organized crime, of which he was accused by specialized police from the State’s Prosecutor General of Justice.”
In its judgement, the federal tribunal decided in favour of the indigenous man: “due to the violations of his human rights it awarded him the amparo outright, which has the effect of absolving him completely of the acts for which he spent more than two years unjustly imprisoned.”
With this resolution the doors are open for the judge of the sixth district in Tuxtla Gutiérrez “to grant Antonio Estrada Estrada his complete freedom in the federal criminal case which is being heard in that court, and for him to finally recover his complete legal freedom,” the lawyer concluded.
————————————————–
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Monday, January 27, 2014
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2014/01/27/politica/019n1pol
****************************************************************
Adherents to the Sixth denounce official moves to dispossess them of ejidal territory
A Chilón commissioner is collecting signatures to cancel the amparo “through deceptions”
They demand the “complete freedom” of Antonio Estrada; each month he has to appear before the court
By: Hermann Bellinghausen,
La Jornada, Saturday, January 25, 2014
Ocosingo, Chiapas, January 24, 2014
The ejidatarios [communal landholders] of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to The Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, have denounced that the officialist [pro-government] authorities are preparing a new fraudulent move to justify the handing over of part of the ejidal territory to the government for purposes of tourism, and in this way to consolidate a dispossession which has been underway since 2011.
The Tzeltal ejidatarios, from the official municipality of Chilón, pointed out “the deceptions and corruptions of Alejandro Moreno Gómez, officialist commissioner, and his vigilance council chairman, Samuel Díaz Guzmán, who are deceiving the ejidatarios and the people in general in the town of Sebastián Bachajón with false promises of getting a government coffee project, and are asking them for a copy of the certificate of land rights and of the IFE’s voting credential, supposedly to secure that project.”
However, that “is a lie, because we know that once again they are going to fabricate assembly minutes with falsified signatures of ejidatarios, in order to ask the seventh district court, with its seat in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, for the cancellation of our amparo [protective order] 274/2011. This is the true intention of Moreno Gómez, advised by the bad state and federal governments, behind the backs of the general assembly of ejidatarios, which is the highest body.” With this manoeuvre “they are seeking to eliminate obstacles to keeping our lands, violating the bad government’s own laws and violating our right as a people recognized in the Constitution and international treaties.”
At the same time the indigenous denounce that the government of Manuel Velasco Coello “did not completely free our compañero Antonio Estrada Estrada (prisoner until last December), because they only took him out of the prison, but legally they continue to hold him guilty of the attack of which two specialized Palenque police accused him. He must sign every eight days at the sixth district court in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, because they also fabricated the crime of carrying a federal firearm against him, when the compañero was tortured. He is innocent and has no economic resources.”
In their denunciation, the ejidatarios say that last December 24th, when Estrada Estrada was released, the Undersecretary of Government, Carlos Morelos Rodríguez, “went to the Catazajá Prison to make him sign a document, telling him that the board of reconciliation of the Chiapas government needed it to give him freedom that same day, and that he would not be released if he did not sign it; so the compañero signed it.” Afterwards, the state authorities delivered that document to the third collegiate tribunal in Tuxtla Gutiérrez “so that it would cancel protective order 915/2013 which was in place against the sentence of seven years for robbery and organized crime.”
The Alejandro Díaz Santiz case
The ejidatarios demand from the government: “the immediate cancellation of the charges against our compañero, and also the release of Alejandro Díaz Santiz, member of solidarity with the Voice of El Amate, who is held in Cereso Number 5 in San Cristóbal de las Casas”.
They warn that the people of San Sebastián Bachajón will continue resisting “the dispossession and persecution from the bad state and federal governments.” They greet the peoples and indigenous communities of Mexico and the world “who are also fighting for Mother Earth and don’t let themselves be overcome by the violence, discrimination and contempt from the bad government and its capitalist entrepreneurs, who seek to make us disappear so they can take over our land and its natural resources”.
They demand that: “our people and organization be respected” and they reiterate: “we are not going to allow the humiliations from the bad government and those who want to continue dispossessing us and discriminating against us just for being poor and indigenous. We will continue fighting for what is ours, even though the government may not like it.”
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2014/01/25/politica/015n1pol
******************************************************************************
Communiqué from San Sebastian Bachajón, 22nd January, 2014
San Sebastian Bachajón continues to resist dispossession and persecution from the bad federal and state governments.
FROM THE EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 22nd JANUARY, 2014
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To public opinion
Compañeros and compañeras, the people of San Sebastian Bachajón continue resisting in struggle against the dispossession and persecution from the bad federal and state governments. We greet all the peoples and indigenous communities of Chiapas, Mexico and the world who are also fighting for Mother Earth and do not let themselves be overcome by the violence, discrimination and contempt from the bad government and its capitalist entrepreneurs who seek to make us disappear so they can take over our land and natural resources for personal and financial gain.
We denounce the deceptions and corruptions of Alejandro Moreno Gómez, the officialist commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón, and the Chairman of the Vigilance Commission, Samuel Diaz Guzman, who are deceiving the ejidatarios and the people in general of the community of San Sebastián Bachajón with false promises to get a government coffee project; and they are asking for a copy of the certificate of land rights and of the IFE voting credential, supposedly in order to get that project, but it is a lie because we know clearly that once again they are going to fabricate assembly minutes with forged signatures of ejidatarios to ask the Seventh District Court in Tuxtla Gutierrez to cancel our amparo 274/2011; this is the real intention of Alejandro Moreno Gómez, advised by the bad state and federal government; behind the backs of the general assembly of ejidatarios, which is the highest body, they are aiming to remove any obstacles to keeping our lands, violating the very laws of the bad government and violating our rights as a people recognized in the constitution and international treaties.
We also denounce that the bad government of Manuel Velasco Coello has not completely freed our compañero Antonio Estrada Estrada, because they only let him out of prison, but they still legally hold him guilty of the assault of which two specialized police from Palenque, Chiapas, accused him. He must attend to sign every week at the Sixth District Court in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas, because they also fabricated the crime of possession of a federal weapon against him when the compañero was tortured; he is innocent and does not have any economic resources.
On 24th December, 2013, when our compañero was freed, the Undersecretary of Government, Carlos Morelos Rodríguez, went to the prison at Catazajá to make our compañero Antonio sign a document, telling him that the Bureau of Reconciliation of the Government of Chiapas needed [his signature] to give him his freedom that same day, and that he would not be released if he did not sign it; so the compañero signed it. Afterwards the Government of Chiapas delivered that document to the Third Collegiate Court in Tuxtla Gutierrez so that it would cancel amparo 915/2013, which was in place against the 7-year sentence for assault and organized crime.
We demand from the bad government the immediate cancellation of the charges against our compañero Antonio Estrada Estrada, and also the liberation of our compañero Alejandro Díaz Santiz, of solidarity with the voice of el amate, held at cereso number 5 in San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas.
We demand respect for our people and organization, we will not allow the humiliations from the bad government and from those who want to continue to dispossess us and discriminate against us just for being poor and indigenous; we will continue to fight for what is ours, even though the government does not like it.
We ask all the compañeros and compañeras and national and international solidarity organisations to remain alert as to what is happening in our community.
Never again a Mexico without us.
From the northern zone of Chiapas, receive a hug from the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón.
Attentively
Land and Freedom!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for Political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
No dispossession of indigenous territories!
******************************************************************************
If there is no voice and organisation in the prisons in Chiapas, there will be no freedom
Two more prisoners from Bachajón, Chiapas, are free thanks to the struggle and organisation of their people, even though, in the state, “justice serves those who administer and flaunt it.”
Desinformémonos
“If they do not raise their voice and let people hear, the same thing will continue to happen as has been happening for years in the prisons of Chiapas; where there is poverty and discrimination, both the innocent and the guilty are victims. It is a system where nobody wins, where there is no justice for society,” said Ricardo Lagunes, lawyer for the political prisoners. adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle in Chiapas, in an interview with Desinformémonos.
On 19th December 2013, Miguel Demeza Jiménez was released, and five days later Antonio Estrada, both adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, from the Tzeltal ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, in the municipality of Chilón. Their innocence was established after a period of legal procedures and denouncements. To Lagunes, “there is no difference between the justice exercised by the Party of the Democratic Revolution, and that of the Institutional Revolutionary or the Green Ecologist parties, because for individuals from the indigenous peoples who are in prison, there is no difference between any of the parties.”
The third judge from el Amate prison granted Miguel Demeza the formal order of freedom, as the crime of theft was unproven, while Antonio Estrada, who was being held in CERSS number 17, Playas de Catazjá, in the north of Chiapas, was released on 24th December.
Miguel Demeza Jiménez is 32 years old, a farmer and mason, and is married with young children who depend on him financially. He was arbitrarily detained, without a warrant, on 7th October 7, 2010, in the city of Ocosingo, while he was eating at a street stall along with his cousin. He was held under arraigo[i] and tortured by the Specialised Unit against the Crime of Kidnapping, which comes under the Special Prosecutor Against Organized Crime of the General Prosecutor of the State of Chiapas; he was subsequently sent to the National Centre for the Social Reintegration of the Sentenced Number 14, “El Amate” (CERSS 14), in Cintalapa de Figueroa, for allegedly being responsible for the kidnapping of a minor, an incident which occurred on October 7th, 2010, and for robbing the Coxito Hardware shop in Ocosingo, on 18th September 2010.
Antonio Estrada Estrada, a Tzeltal campesino originating in the community of Sasamtik, was illegally arrested on August 7th, 2011 by officers of the specialized police. He was sentenced to seven years in prison on charges of assault and organized crime. In both cases there were inconsistencies in the legal process. “For the prisoners of Chiapas, the constant is poverty and discrimination, and a high degree of insensitivity among the judicial and ministerial officials, the public defenders, those who work in the courts, and those who undertake the formalities,” Ricardo Lagunes said.
Besides failures and extreme deficiencies in the administration of justice, states the lawyer, “there is a rejection of those who belong to the indigenous peoples and are living in poverty.”
The case of Miguel, Ricardo Lagunes says, “exemplifies the lack of access to justice and judicial protection, and the discrimination resulting from his economic status and his belonging to an indigenous people. The evidence against him was illegal and insufficient to warrant a criminal prosecution. Miguel was accused of the theft of a mobile phone which was used to organise the kidnapping of a minor, it is the only item which links him to this; moreover, it was possible to demonstrate that the accusation was made illegally and therefore the detention order was in violation of his fundamental rights.”
The lawyer for the indigenous prisoners explains that organisation was decisive: “they gained their liberty by fighting and organizing with their community inside and outside.”
For the justice system in Chiapas, he says the indigenous are invisible.
Alberto Patishtán, Miguel Demeza Jiménez and Antonio Estrada, “had to make themselves visible in this system and no longer be just another prisoner statistic, they opened their eyes and opened the eyes of many people with their freedom, because they realized that you can not wait for justice to reach the institutions.”
“Rich people commit crimes and the settlement occurs in a political way,” he explains, “for example in the case of former Governor Pablo Salazar Mendiguchía, who went to jail and was released through politics, not justice. On the other hand, there are the indigenous prisoners such as Alejandro Díaz Sántiz, who has been in prison for 15 years, four periods with governments of different parties, and he is still inside, “concludes Ricardo Lagunes.
Antonio Estrada Estrada, former prisoner from San Sebastián Bachajón, is free!!
Antonio Estrada Estrada (on the right) is here seen with Alberto Patishtán Gómez.
All the prisoners from San Sebastián Bachajón are now free!!!
Antonio is talking on the telephone to the last remaining prisoner who is an adherent to the Sexta, Alejandro Díaz Santiz.
Photo: Marta Molina
*************************************************************************
Support and Solidarity from the UK for the community of San Sebastián Bachajón
The UK has a long-standing commitment of support and solidarity with the indigenous Tzeltal ejidatarios (common landholders) of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, situated in the northern jungle zone of Chiapas, Mexico, in their struggle to defend their land, territory and natural resources against plunder and dispossession from the Mexican state and its friends in multinational corporations.
Members of the South-West England Committee of the True Word and the Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group came together recently to hold a public meeting, which included a screening of the new film about this struggle: “Land and Resistance in San Sebastián Bachajón”. This moving film, with subtitles in English, was produced by the free media collective Los Tejemedios from Mexico City.
The film shows the dignified resistance of the people from this ejido, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, against ongoing government repression, and their love and respect for their mother earth. It highlights their continuing struggle in defence of their autonomy as indigenous peoples, and to prevent plans to seize their ancestral lands to build a luxury ‘ecotourist’ resort. It also tells of the cruel assassination of their beloved community leader Juan Vázquez Guzmán last April, which still remains unpunished, and how the struggle continues in his memory.
The audience greatly appreciated the opportunity to see a little of the ejido and its lands, the disputed gravel quarry, the beauty of the area, and to learn more about the legal struggle, and the now ex- prisoners of Bachajón, from the ejido’s lawyer Ricardo Lagunes Gasca. It enabled them to hear the words of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, and to see his burial place. They said afterwards that the film had strengthened their support for their brothers and sisters from San Sebastián Bachajón, and also inspired them to continue with their own more local struggles.
Another screening of the film is planned soon.
Now we are celebrating the liberation of Miguel Demeza Jiménez and Antonio Estrada Estrada. Viva Bachajón!
We would like to send a message of love, solidarity and support to the compas of San Sebastián Bachajón, from our own humble struggles on the other side of the world.
The film with English subtitles can be seen here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-kfc4Z0YpvE
For more information in English and the latest news about San Sebastián Bachajón: https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com/en-ingles/
Write a letter in support of San Sebastián Bachajón: http://dorsetchiapassolidarity.wordpress.com/2013/10/28/request-to-write-a-letter-in-support-of-san-sebastian-bachajon/
*****************************************************************
FROM THE EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 24th DECEMBER 2013
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To national and international human rights defenders
To public opinion
Compañeros and compañeras from Mexico and the world, our rebel and dignified heart continues fighting for justice and for respect for our autonomy as a people, by struggling we keep alive the struggle of compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán, who fell in the defense of the territory of San Sebastián Bachajón.
We recently made public knowledge the fact that our organization has founded the gravel quarry Nah Chawuk, in exercise of our right as indigenous people and as ejidatarios to control and protect our territory, and in response to the mismanagement of the principal gravel quarry which currently remains in the hands of the bad government because they have handed it over to the former ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez (aka the Goyito), the current commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez, and the chairman of the Vigilance Commission Samuel diaz Guzman, together with the lands dispossessed since February 2nd 2011, where the bad government has built a toll booth which is administered by the National Commission for Protected Natural Areas.
We also denounce that the political party supporter and officialist (1) ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón, Alejandro Moreno Gómez and the Chairman of the Vigilance Commission Samuel Diaz Guzman, have threatened to violently displace us from our gravel quarry Nah Chawuk. These true criminals who say they are authorities of the ejido continue to threaten our organization with violent eviction and with putting up barbed wire on our gravel quarry and say that they are going to do it with the backing of the public security forces. We also have knowledge that they are forging signatures in order to fabricate new assembly minutes behind the back of the General Assembly of Ejidatarios, because they want to illegally overthrow our amparo (2) 274/2011 which is still in force and therefore they have not been able to finally consummate their dispossession. The last assembly minutes forged by Alejandro Moreno Gómez were declared illegal by the Third Collegiate Tribunal in Tuxtla Gutierrez.
We have on two occasions received a summons from the government delegate in Chilón, Chiapas, Francisco Demeza Hernandez, for the 5th and 19th December because he wants to force us to sit down and talk with Alejandro Moreno Gómez and Samuel Diaz Guzman, as if all the injustice, impunity and violence could be resolved in a few minutes sitting in his office, when we have a compañero of our organization in prison, our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán cowardly murdered with impunity and our territory dispossessed with the greatest government authoritarianism and cynicism. Such invitations are a trap by the bad government so they can say that they are working and fixing the problem of the ejido.
We hold fully responsible for any aggression, threat, or attempt on the life and integrity of the authorities of our organization, or of our compañeros and compañeras who work in and care for the gravel quarry Nah Chawuk, the following: Alejandro Moreno Gómez officialist ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajon, Samuel Diaz guzmán officialist chairman of the vigilance commission of san Sebastian bachajon also by occupation a charro (3) teacher, Francisco Guzman Jimenez (aka the Goyito) officialist former ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajon currently a minion and worker at the toll booth of the bad government , the municipal president of Chilón Leonardo Rafael Guirao Aguilar, Manuel Velasco Coello governor of the state of Chiapas, and Enrique Peña Nieto, president of the republic.
We will not take one step back in our struggle, nor will we allow ourselves to be humiliated and discriminated against in our struggle and organization, because we want to continue being a people, we want to defend our culture and identity, we want to continue being what we are, as our late compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán used to say.
We demand the immediate release of our compañero ANTONIO ESTRADA ESTRADA (4) unjustly detained in Playas de Catazajá, Chiapas, imprisoned for the struggle of our people. We also demand the release of compañero Alejandro Diaz Santiz of solidarity with the Voice of el amate, held in cereso number 5 in San Cristobal, Chiapas.
Never again a Mexico without us.
From the northern zone of Chiapas, receive a hug from women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón.
Attentively
Land and Freedom!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for Political prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón Struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous territories!
Notes:
(1) Officialist – government-supporting
(2) Amparo – order for legal protection
(3) Charro – a trade union leader appointed by, and supporting, the government
(4) This comunicado was read before the liberation of Antonio Estrada Estrada
*****************************************************************************
Antonio Estrada Estrada, unjustly imprisoned since October 2011, is free!!
Another ejidatario from San Sebastián Bachajón in Chiapas is released
By Hermann Bellinghausen
La Jornada, 24 Dec 2013
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas. On Tuesday, in the early afternoon, Antonio Estrada Estrada, adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle and resident of the Tzeltal ejido San Sebastián Bachajón was released; he was being held at the Center for the Social Reinsertion of the Sentenced (CERSS) number 17, in Playas de Catazjá, in the north of Chiapas.
On Tuesday 19th Miguel Demeza Jiménez, also an adherent to the Sixth from the same ejido, had been freed. With the release of Estrada Estrada, San Sebastián Bachajón no longer has any “political prisoners”, who, in the context of resistance to official tourism projects and the dispossession of territory by federal and state agencies, and at the cost of dividing the ejidatarios, had been apprehended and prosecuted during the government of Juan Sabines Guerrero for crimes they did not commit.
The ejidatarios in resistance had said hours before: “Our rebel and dignified heart continues fighting for justice and for respect for our autonomy as a people, by struggling we keep alive the struggle of compañero Juan Vazquez Guzman,” who was assassinated a few months ago at the doors of his home, presumably because of his participation in the defense of the territory of San Sebastián Bachajón. The crime remains unpunished.
The dispossession denounced by the ejidatarios dates from February 2, 2011, when “the bad government built a toll booth administered by the National Commission for Protected Natural Areas.”
After the release of Estrada Estrada, the only adherent to the Sixth who is still a prisoner is Alejandro Díaz Santiz from Solidarity with the Voice of el Amate, who is held in CERSS number 5 in San Cristóbal de las Casas.
********************************************************************
Miguel Demeza Jiménez, prisoner from San Sebastián Bachajón, is free!!!
The Tzeltal Miguel Demeza is released after three years in prison for crimes he did not commit
**Antonio Estrada Estrada could be freed from CERSS at any time
**Alejandro Díaz Santiz remains imprisoned, despite the undertaking by the state government
Hermann Bellinghausen
La Jornada
Monday December 23, 2013
Miguel Demeza Jiménez, adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle and resident of the Tzeltal ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, Chilón municipality, Chiapas, was released from the prison of San Cristobal de las Casas on 19th December for lack of evidence, according to the determination of a judge at El Amate prison in Cintalapa de Figueroa, where he had spent more than three years in prison, accused of crimes he did not commit.
Similarly, the prompt release is expected of Antonio Estrada Estrada, also from San Sebastián Bachajón, who is being held at the State Centre for the Social Reintegration of the Sentenced (CERSS) number 17 in Playas de Catazajá.
Ricardo Lagunes Gasca, lawyer for the two indigenous men, announced that Demeza Jiménez, who had recently been transferred to CERSS number 5 in San Cristobal de las Casas, was notified on Thursday of the release order which had been issued by the third criminal judge of Cintalapa “for lack of evidence to process with respect to the crime of robbery with violence, in compliance with the decision on amparo 1478/2012, granted due to the different violations of his human rights committed by the Office of the Specialised Prosecutor Against Organized Crime (Fecdo, its initials in Spanish) of the Prosecutor General of Justice of the State of Chiapas in October 2010.”
On Saturday 21, Demeza Jiménez “was notified of the termination of the criminal proceedings in relation to the crime of kidnapping, [of which he was] unlawfully accused by the same Fecdo.” This was as a consequence of the waiving of the criminal proceedings by the state prosecutor.
At 3 pm the same day, the indigenous man was greeted by his family and members of his organization outside the prison.
The persecution of the indigenous people of San Sebastián Bachajón has taken place within the context of their opposition to the dispossession of their ejidal territory carried out by federal and state authorities, in favour of its use by tourists for access to the waterfalls of Agua Azul, in the neighbouring municipality of Tumbalá.
Subject to the possible release of his compañero Antonio Estrada Estrada being confirmed, and two months after the liberation of Professor Alberto Patishtán Gomez, the only indigenous adherent to the sixth who remains imprisoned in Chiapas is the Tzotzil Alejandro Díaz Santiz, who has been imprisoned for 15 of his 33 years. His release from CERSS No 5 remains pending, despite the repeated promise of the state government to obtain his release.
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/12/23/index.php?section=politica&article=021n1pol
*****************************************************************
Amparo upheld for Miguel Demeza Jiménez, prisoner in El Amate
*He is an adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, imprisoned in 2010
*His defence points out multiple violations of the human rights of the accused, during the legal process
Hermann Bellinghausen
La Jornada, 12th December, 2013
The prisoner, a Tzeltal from San Sebastián Bachajón, municipality of Chilón, was identified as probably responsible for robbery with violence at the Coxito Hardware shop in Ocosingo in 2010, and the kidnapping of a minor. Photo from the archive by José Carlo Gonzalez
San Cristobal de Las Casas, Chiapas – The legal struggle for the liberation of Miguel Demeza Jiménez, ejidatario from San Sebastián Bachajón and adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, imprisoned since 2010 in El Amate prison in Cintalapa Figueroa on false charges, won a battle on 9th December when the Second collegiate Tribunal of the Twentieth Circuit confirmed the amparo (1), granted last August to Demeza Jiménez by the first judge of the Central Auxiliary District of the fourth region in Xalapa, Veracruz (where the file was sent.)
According to the indigenous man’s defence lawyer, “when resolving the appeal filed by the Ocosingo hardware store manager Emilio Adiel Argueta Ruiz, and the Federal Public Ministry in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, which challenged the ruling of amparo that recognized the human rights violations committed against Demeza, the Appeals Court upheld the ruling of the federal judge, meaning that in the coming days the third judge of Cintalapa prison will have to give immediate compliance to the protective verdict.”
The Impartiality of the Prosecutor is in Doubt
The judgment of the Collegiate Tribunal confirming the amparo protection granted to Demeza Jiménez, the defence lawyer Ricardo Lagunes Gasca points out, “shows the various violations of his right to access to justice, and to judicial guarantees and protection, which was denied by the Chiapas authorities. It confirms once again that he has been unjustly imprisoned for more than three years, using evidence obtained illegally by the Special Prosecutor against Organized Crime (FECDO), and endorsed by the administration of local justice, which calls into question the impartiality and independence with which the General Prosecutor of Justice for the State must act.
“On August 13, David Gustavo León Hernández, district judge based in Xalapa, “granted the amparo and the protection of the federal court to Demeza Jiménez, in respect of the detention order issued against him by a judge in Cintalapa on September 30, 2012,” for the alleged crime of robbery with violence “which the FECDO illegally attributed to him.” Judge León Hernández ruled that the detention order “violates Article 16 of the Constitution, since the third judge of El Amate prison has not properly stated the basis and the logical and legal reasons to prove the probable criminal responsibility of Demeza Jiménez.”
The detainee, a Tzeltal from San Sebastián Bachajón, in the municipality of Chilón, is 32 years old, a campesino and mason, married, with young children. “Demeza Jiménez was arrested without a warrant on October 7, 2010, in Ocosingo – his defence lawyer explains – held under arraigo (2) and tortured by the Special Unit against the Crime of Kidnapping, a dependency of FECDO; he was then sent to El Amate prison as probably responsible for the crime of robbery with violence at the Coxite Hardware Store in Ocosingo on September 18, 2010, and probably responsible for the kidnapping of a minor which occurred three weeks later.”
The manager of the hardware store, Argueta Ruiz, reported the events two days later, and stated that at the time of the robbery, “he did not recognize the assailants, and that they hit him on the head so hard that he lost consciousness.” On October 15, the specialized police presented Argueta Ruiz before the Public Ministry, since “his mobile phone number was linked to that of his friend Rubén Aníbal Ramírez Monge, with whom he rescued the kidnapped minor.” Then he quietly changed his statements.
“Although there were more leads to follow in an investigation of Argueta Ruiz and Ramírez Monge for their probable involvement in the kidnapping, they were released; they attributed the responsibility for the crime to Miguel in a manner which was illegal and in violation of his human rights,” concludes Lagunes Gasca.
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/12/12/index.php?section=politica&article=019n1pol
(1) ‘Amparo’, literally ‘protection’, is a legal right granted in the Mexican Constitution to individuals and corporations, so that they may appeal to successively higher courts for an order of protection against an action by any level of government believed to be violating their rights. (The amparo is comparable in U.S. law to an injunction to block a government action, or an appeal against a judicial decision, including a criminal conviction.)
(2) ‘Arraigo’, literally root, is a legal concept under which a suspect may be held without formal charges for up to 40 days. By court order, a suspect may be held for another 40 days without charges. International human rights organizations regularly strongly recommend that the arraigo be eliminated.
*************************************************************************
Federal Tribunal resolves amparo (protective order) in favor of the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón
** It is the second time that they have declared the decision of the seventh district judge illegal
** Federal and state governments seek to construct a tourist complex on their territories
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
La Jornada, Friday, November 29, 2013
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, November 28, 2013
A federal tribunal in Tuxtla Gutiérrez has resolved an amparo (protective order) in favor of the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón and against the occupation of part of the ejidal territory, since February 2011, by the state and federal governments for the purpose of “imposing a world class tourist project,” said the indigenous concerned.
In the decision, published last Monday, November 25th, the federal tribunal “revoked as illegal the decision issued on July 22, 2013 by the seventh district judge residing in Tuxtla Gutiérrez; he had declared the constitutional case in defense of their lands, filed by the Tzeltal campesinos, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, to be inadmissable”, reported Ricardo Lagunes Gasca, legal representative for the indigenous campesinos.
At its session on November 14th, when resolving amparo under review 274/2013, the third collegiate tribunal of the twentieth circuit in the Chiapas capital “granted legal right to the indigenous of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, located in the state’s Northern Zone, who are defending their lands from the plunder by the state and federal governments which has been perpetrated since February 2, 2011, with the aim of controlling their territory in order to impose a tourist project.” The lands which the ejido owners are demanding to be returned to them also include the access road to the Agua Azul Waterfalls, a natural bathing area which is visited each year by hundreds of thousands of tourists.
The defense details: “The tribunal found that the seventh district judge, by failing to notify the general assembly of ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón of the demand for amparo filed in a substitute form by the ejido owners, adherents to the Sixth, infringed the laws of procedure and left the complaining ejido defenseless.” At the same time, the federal tribunal “dismissed as without legal value the document presented by the officialist (pro-government) ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián, Alejandro Moreno Gómez, signed by himself and other representatives of the ejido, with which they sought to dispense with the case for amparo without the authorization and knowledge of the general assembly.”
It is the second time that a federal tribunal has declared to be illegal the decision issued by the seventh district judge, who “since the admission of the demand for amparo on March 4th, 2011, has conducted himself without observing the principles of impartiality, independence and objectivity, favoring the dispossession at all times through arbitrary and subjective decisions,” added Lagunes Gasca.
“It is lamentable –he adds– that two years after having filed the case for constitutionality, there is still no determination to protect the territory of the Tzeltal people of San Sebastián, a fact which encourages impunity, violence and dispossession of the original peoples by state and private agents.”
Given the “evident ineffectiveness” of the case for amparo in protecting the Tzeltal territory, on May 26th of this year a petition on the case was formally presented to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) which has its headquarters in Washington. The ejidatarios’ defense also “requested the implementation of precautionary measures within the framework of the petition, to guarantee the territorial integrity of the indigenous people and the personal integrity of their defenders, which were placed at great risk and vulnerability as a result of the unpunished assassination of the community leader Juan Vázquez Guzmán on April 24th,” at the door of his house.
On June 19th, the CIDH communicated to the ejido owners and adherents to the Sixth that it had requested information from the Mexican government about the issue, a request that, as far as is known, has still not received a response.
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/11/29/politica/019n1pol
**************************************************************************
Interview with the compañeros of San Sebastián Bachajón
Bachajón and the Importance of its Defence
San Sebastian Bachajón is located in the central jungle area of the state of Chiapas, in the official municipality of Chilón, Zapatista Autonomous Region San José en Rebeldía. The location of this place has geostrategic importance because it contains a natural area with strategic resources such as land, water, biodiversity in flora and fauna, cultural knowledge, and so on. Therefore, for a decade and a half, the government has been trying to strip the ejidatarios of all the wealth of the area; the first step was to “safeguard” the territory through designating it as a Protected Area for Flora and Fauna (APFyF).
The paradigmatic place is the Agua Azul Waterfalls Biosphere Reserve, where the strategy of land grabbing has been carried out, at least since the nineties, through the demagoguery of “eco-tourism” promoted by the government of Chiapas since Juan Sabines; it is used for the extraction, sale and rent of land and, therefore, for the accumulation of capital. This biosphere has a high capacity for carbon capture, abundant water, and great potential for tourism, which means that the political class and transnational corporations are behind the scheme.
However, this territory is fortunate to have had as its guardian (votán) the men and women of San Sebastian Bachajón, since before the call to organize and defend the territory against greedy capitalist politics made through the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle; in 2008 over 1800 ejidatarios, adherents to the Other Campaign, chose to manage the ticket booth of this tourist complex, exercising their right to the use and enjoyment of their territory.
Alongside this came the entry of private companies, since March 2008 the companies Norton Consulting, Inc. and EDSA Construction, in the context of the implementation of the Mesoamerica Project, better known as Plan Puebla Panama (PPP), have sought to exploit the area for tourism, bringing with it the construction of hotel complexes and transport infrastructure, such as the San Cristobal-Palenque highway and the expansion and relocation of the airport at Palenque. All planned jointly through the state and federal government, with the complicity of the National Fund for Tourism (FONATUR), the Secretariat of Tourism of the State of Chiapas, the secretariat of tourism and international relations, the Ministry of Communications and Transport ( SCT), the Federal Prosecutor for Environmental Protection (PROFEPA) and the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH), among others.
In short, the struggle to defend San Sebastián Bachajón is the struggle against national and local political mafias and against capitalist corporations eager to dispossess indigenous peoples of their natural resources, their community and their culture.
The History of the community of Bachajón
http://www.regeneracionradio.org/live/music/liberacion/Entrevista_Bachajon_nov_2013/Historia.mp3
Current situation: between community building, attacks and harassment.
Last September, by agreement of the assembly, it was decided to set up a new gravel quarry, for their own community; they, unlike the authorities, think it should benefit any community member regardless of whether they belong to the organization or not. This quarry will allow them to “control” a resource of the ejido, but the authorities are arguing that the gravel extraction is damaging an ecological reserve, which is completely false, since the compañeros can prove with legal documents that this is not true[1]. They are not only discrediting the works through the media, they are also currently threatening to send public forces to evict the camp which is guarding the quarry.
About the current project of the gravel quarry
On account of its struggle, Bachajón has suffered various forms of harassment and persecution against members of the organization, as in the case of the compañeros Antonio Estrada Estrada, who is being held in el Amate, and who is being charged with the crime of assault on a highway, for allegedly attacking a convoy of federal police while in possession of a firearm, and Miguel Demeza Jiménez, who is currently in cereso # 5, on a charge of robbery with violence; ultimately, we know that the two are being charged for their participation in the struggle.
According to a report in the daily el Heraldo de Chiapas, dated November 7, “the state government is discussing some matters concerning the indigenous of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón in Chilón municipality, who are being held in prisons in the municipalities of La Libertad and Playas de Catazajá, who could be beneficiaries of a pardon,” said the Secretary of Government Óscar Eduardo Ramírez Aguilar.
Another case which is in impunity is the kidnapping of Herminio Estrada Gómez, aged 18, on 5th November in the community of Xanil 2nd section, in the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, they also took his pointer vehicle; fortunately he has been released, but not before attempting to extort 40,000 pesos from him. Currently the compañeros are filing a complaint against the illegal kidnapping of the compañero, indicating judicially those who perpetrated it: Santiago Álvaro Moreno the officialist deputy ejidal commissioner, along with Juan Álvaro Moreno and Santiago Álvaro Gómez – all three are neighbours, from the community of Xanil 2nd section – and Manuel Jiménez Moreno from Pamalha community.
On the repression
http://www.regeneracionradio.org/live/music/liberacion/Entrevista_Bachajon_nov_2013/represion.mp3
One of the most unfortunate occurrences which the compañeros have suffered is the assassination on April 24th this year of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, who was murdered outside his home. Since that time there has been no evidence of any effective investigation into his murder, and neither the material nor the intellectual authors of the crime have been identified or punished. It seems to be another example of the impunity which so often prevails in the case of crimes against the indigenous peoples of Mexico.
At this time it is hoped that the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation will take on the case of the community, the lawyer Ricardo Lagunes said in an interview: “this procedure of amparo 274/2011 is for dispossession of land through violence by public forces. The case is before a Federal Judge, and on two previous occasions they were denied a judgement in their favour, on the contrary, their right to defend their land was not recognised. Currently the second application for review by the Third Collegiate Court in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas, is being resolved, and in the near future there will be a response to the request to take the case to the Supreme Court”. It is important to state that the case has reached a tragic level through the assassination of Juan Vázquez who was the one who promoted the amparo.
Interview with lawyer Ricardo Lagunes
http://www.regeneracionradio.org/live/music/liberacion/Entrevista_Bachajon_nov_2013/abogado.mp3
So, the struggle of the compañerxs is of great relevance at a global level, not only because of the denouncements that have been made, but also for the creation of the proposal for an autonomous struggle, based in their indigenous worldview (cosmovision) and for the freedom of the indigenous peoples.
There is national and international support such as the letter campaign proposed by the by the UK Zapatista Solidarity Network, to send or deliver the letter (below) to your nearest Mexican government office, embassy or consulate, as well as to the media and other organizations.
A message to radio listeners
http://www.regeneracionradio.org/live/music/liberacion/Entrevista_Bachajon_nov_2013/mensaje.mp3
[1] i.e. that the quarry is NOT inside the ecological reserve
Addresses to send the letter to
***********************************************************************
UK DEMANDS JUSTICE FOR THE PEOPLE OF SAN SEBASTIÁN BACHAJÓN
Representatives of groups from around the UK delivered a letter to the Mexican Embassy in London this week, demonstrating against the continued harassment of the indigenous Tzeltal peoples of San Sebastián Bachajón, in Chiapas, South East Mexico.
This protest was part of a worldwide campaign to alert the public about the situation in San Sebastian Bachajón, through letter writing and demonstrations. The October 24th celebration marked the six month anniversary of the asassination of their community leader, Juan Vázquez Guzmán. Since then there has been no evidence of any kind of effective police investigation into his murder, nor have the material and intellectual authors of the crime been identified or punished in any way.
The community of San Sebastian Bachajón has been an inspiration for their resistance and their struggle for land and territory in Chiapas in recent years. There are plans to convert their lands into a lucrative tourist destination for the nearby waterfalls of Agua Azul. As a result, the community has suffered many years of violence, dispossession, threats, abuse, arrests on false charges and invasion and occupation by state forces.
Members of groups from the Zapatista Solidarity Network in the UK and other European groups are calling for the return of their lands to the people of San Sebastián Bachajón, and respect for their rights as indigenous peoples. They are also demanding a full investigation into the murder of Juan Vazquez Guzman, that those responsible for his murder are brought to justice and that the Bachajón prisoners are released.
On delivering the letter to the Mexican Embassy in London, the groups reported a recent alarming increase in threats, intimidation and harassment against the community. Local pro-government authorities and political party members are organising with officials from the municipal and state governments to evict the common landholders from their recently opened gravel quarry, which they are working collectively for the benefit of the community. The groups in the UK and Europe demanding an immediate end to this climate of violence against the common landholders of Bachajón, and hold the three levels of government responsible for any injury that they may suffer.
The letter follows:
Sr Alejandro Ives Estivill Castro, Mexican Ambassador to the UK
Embassy of Mexico, 16 St George Street
London W1S 1FD November 2013
Dear Sir
Re: The dispossession of the common lands of the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, the assassination of their community leader Juan Vázquez Guzmán, and the unjust imprisonment of Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Demeza Jiménez.
24th October, 2013, marks the commemoration of six months having passed since the community leader and human rights defender from the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón in Chiapas, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, was shot down in the doorway of his home on 24th April, 2013. Since that time there has been no evidence of any effective investigation into his murder, and neither the material nor the intellectual authors of the crime have been identified or punished. It seems to be another example of the impunity which so often prevails in the case of crimes against the indigenous peoples of Mexico.
This assassination, together with the repression being experienced by the indigenous Tseltal inhabitants of this community, forms part of a violent campaign to displace the ejidatarios from their ancestral lands and territory in order to construct a luxury upmarket tourist development.
We wish to express our profound concerns at the failure to adequately investigate this crime and at the ongoing campaign of harassment, dispossession and criminalisation being conducted by the three levels of government, and their allies in big business, against the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, with the use of state police and military forces and locally recruited paramilitary groups, which has been underway since 2007.
On 3rd November 2013, the ejidatarios denounced the risk of “a violent eviction at any time from our gravel quarry, Nah Chawuk, which we recently opened as an organization and as ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, to benefit the people in general.” We assert their right as indigenous people to open this gravel quarry in their territory and will hold the three levels of government responsible for any harm suffered by those who work there.
The judgement concerning the petition for amparo 274/2011 of the Seventh District Court in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, presented by the people of Bachajón against the arbitrary deprivation of their common lands following the mass arrest in February 2011, and in favour of the protection of their territory and collective rights, has been handled with a disturbing lack of impartiality and independence. This demonstrates a shocking lack of respect for indigenous peoples, contrary to their rights established under ILO Convention 169 concerning Indigenous and Tribal Peoples, and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, both of which have been signed by the Mexican government. The ejidatarios have asked the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation to address this case, and have also asked the Third Collegiate Tribunal in Tuxtla Gutiérrez to study the Appeal Hearing 274/2013 and, in accordance with its powers, to ask the highest court in the land to resolve the request for amparo from the indigenous Tseltales; therefore we expect the court to treat the ejidatarios with fairness and justice, as is their right.
The repression being endured by the ejidatarios, as a result of their resistance and their defence of their territory and the natural resources of the area, forced them, on 26th May, 2013, to take their case to the Inter-American Human Rights Commission, based in Washington DC, in order to safeguard their rights and the integrity of their territory, and to protest the arbitrary deprivation of the life of Juan Vázquez Guzmán. We insist that it is essential and fundamental to guarantee the safety and security of those who seek to defend the communally held lands of indigenous peoples against plunder and dispossession.
Finally we call for the liberation of the Bachajón ejidatarios Antonio Estrada Estrada, prisoner in CERSS 17, Playas de Catazajá, Chiapas, and Miguel Demeza Jiménez, prisoner in CERSS 14, El Amate. Both of these men have had their rights to due process violated, were denied access to a translator and a lawyer with knowledge of their Tseltal language and culture, and were tortured to make them confess to crimes which they did not commit. We also call for the immediate release of Alejandro Díaz Santiz, from Solidarity with the Voice of El Amate.
We therefore demand:
- A full and fair investigation into the material and intellectual authors of the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, and punishment of those responsible
- Respect for the fundamental human rights of the indigenous Tseltal peoples of San Sebastián Bachajón, and guarantees for their security and integrity
- Respect and guarantees for their right to the full use and enjoyment of their territory
- Respect for their right to self-determination and the construction of their autonomy
- That the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation uses its power to resolve in a just, impartial and objective manner the case for amparo 274/2011 of the Seventh District Court in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, and, currently in process, amparo review 274/2013, before the Third Collegiate Tribunal in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas
- An end to the plunder and dispossession, the theft of commons, the militarisation of the area, and to the threats and violence being experienced
- The immediate release of Antonio Estrada Estrada, Miguel Demeza Jiménez, and Alejandro Díaz Santiz
We will continue to monitor closely any developments in the area, and to offer the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón and the family of Juan Vázquez Guzmán our total support.
Respectfully
UK Zapatista Solidarity Network
Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group
Edinburgh Chiapas Solidarity Group
KIPTIK, Bristol
London Mexico Solidarity Group
Manchester Zapatista Solidarity Group
Zapatista Solidarity Group – Essex
Les trois passants, Paris, France.
Comitato Chiapas “Maribel” – Bergamo, Italy
Nodo Solidale, Italy and Mexico
CafeZ de Liège, Belgium
CGT-Estado Español, Spanish State
Centro de Documentación sobre Zapatismo -CEDOZ- Spanish State
Caracol Zaragoza, Spanish State
Asociaciòn Ya Basta! Milano, Italia
Plataforma Vasca de Solidaridad con Txiapas, Eskerrik
Gruppe B.A.S.T.A., Munster, Germany
Asociacion Espoir Chiapas / Esperanza chiapas; France
Plataforma de Solidaridad con Chiapas y Guatemala de Madrid, Spanish State
Caracol mundo-eco de latido en solidaridad, Austria
Mutvitz 13, Marseilles, France
Updated version of the letter in English and Spanish:
*********************************************************************
Risk of eviction in Bachajón
The government-supporting ejidatarios promote the taking over of the community’s new gravel quarry, and kidnap a young defender of the territory. The community reaffirms its peaceful resistance.
JAIME QUINTANA GUERRERO
Mexico. In San Sebastián Bachajón, the pro-government ejidatarios “are acting with violence and in an armed manner” against the Tzeltales, who are defending their territory against a tourist megaproject, says the lawyer Ricardo Lagunes. The kidnapping of a young man and the threat of eviction from a gravel quarry are the most recent episodes in a conflict which has already left one person dead and several prisoners.
On November 5, 2013, Herminio Estrada Gómez, 18 year old son of Bartolo Estrada Silvano, was kidnapped in the Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón. The kidnappers are Santiago Álvaro Moreno, pro-government deputy ejidal commissioner, Juan Álvaro Moreno, Manuel Jiménez Moreno and Santiago Álvaro Gómez. They also confiscated his vehicle, denounced the Tzeltal ejidatarios. “At this moment we do not know if he is in good physical condition and health,” the indigenous reported.
The community of San Sebastian Bachajón decided, reports Ricardo Lagunes, lawyer for the Tzeltales, “to open a new gravel quarry called Nah Chawuk on ejido land, as they are defending their right to use their own resources.” In 2011, the main quarry was taken over by a pro-government indigenous man, but “there was resistance from the people who are adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle.” The ejidatarios denounced that two people, Alejandro Moreno Gómez and Samuel Díaz Guzmán, are seeking their eviction, with the use of public security forces, from the new gravel quarry. Lagunes reports that “they are threatening the people with dispossession, are acting violently and in an armed manner.”
The ejidatarios explained in a communiqué that the opening of Nah Chawuk “is an exercise of our rights as indigenous people and ejidatarios to control and protect our territory, and in response to the mismanagement of the main gravel quarry”, which at that time was given to Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, former ejidal commissioner, along with the lands from which they have been dispossessed since February 2, 2011, – where a ticket booth was built which is administered by the National Commission for Protected Natural Areas.
“They decided to use the gravel quarry as part of their resistance,” explains their legal defender. Also “it is a means to bring sustenance to their families, who decided to start this project at the same time as fighting for the prisoners”.
Alejandro Moreno, pro-government ejidal commissioner, began to convene assemblies to evict the gravel bank by an action of the ejido, relates the lawyer. However, “there was no support. And realizing that he had not been successful, he organized a ‘shock group’, that is not backed by the assembly, to act in a violent way to obtain the eviction, like they did in 2011,” explains Lagunes. It is a strategy, reveals the lawyer, to ensure that “the commissioner will have no responsibility for the violence”.
The legal defender warns that government-supporting ejidatarios “are armed and acting with great impunity”, for this reason the ejidatarios decided to inform the public of the attempts at eviction and aggression, and the death threats, “they are resources to demobilize, they are sowing fear in the communities. We are on an alert and we make a call” to civil society.
In the communities there is a strong organization, reports the lawyer, after six months of imprisonment of Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Demeza Jiménez. “We have convened meetings and assemblies, also to keep the memory of Juan Vázquez Guzmán”, he says.
The prisoners
With the release of Alberto Patishtán from prison, explains the lawyer for the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, “there is given an achievement of the indigenous peoples, it makes evident all the failures of the western justice system, the discrimination and the contempt for the most disadvantaged who do not have an equal opportunity to defend themselves.”
In the case of Antonio Estrada, imprisoned since 2011, says Lagunes, an amparo filed against the sentence is to be resolved in the Third Collegiate Tribunal in Tuxtla Gutierrez. Estrada was sentenced to seven years in prison for assault and organized crime. A neighbour of the Sasamtik community, he is currently held in the National Centre for the Social Reintegration of the Sentenced Number 17 “El Bambú” (CERSS 17) in Playas de Catazajá, Chiapas.
On August 7, 2011, Estrada was illegally arrested by members of the specialized police assigned to the Prosecutor General of Justice of the State of Chiapas, who say they were assaulted. The indigenous Tzeltal was apprehended, when he was walking outside his home, without a warrant and without being caught red-handed committing a crime. Not only was he arbitrarily deprived of his freedom, but he was also beaten and tortured in order to get him to sign a ministerial declaration incriminating himself of several crimes. Antonio Estrada was not guaranteed the assistance of a lawyer and an official translator with knowledge of his language and culture.
The officers detained him illegally. They did not present him before the Public Prosecutor in Palenque, Chiapas, until the next day, August 8th. There they linked him to the crimes.
Unfortunately, Lagunes claims, judgments are made in advance “in the courts, and this definitely violates various rights recognized by the Constitution and internationally: the rights to the presumption of innocence, access to justice and a fair trial.”
On 12th November, the Third Collegiate Tribunal will decide the sentence. “We are hoping for a satisfactory response from the court to invalidate the incriminating ministerial declaration in which he was forced to sign a document testifying that he committed the crime,” says the defender.
In their communiqué, the ejidatarios make clear: “We are not going to take one step back in our struggle, nor will we allow ourselves to be humiliated and discriminated against in our struggle and organization.”
“Our organization does not seek confrontation, but it is the bad government and the pro-government ejidal authorities who only seek to destroy the organization,” they conclude their statement. “They are the true provokers of violence in our community and they seek to ensure that there is always division, because they do not want the people to unite against their corruption and looting of our territory.”
Posted on Monday, November 11, 2013
http://desinformemonos.org/2013/11/riesgo-de-desalojo-en-bachajon/
*******************************************************************
Urgent communiqué from San Sebastian Bachajón, November 6th, 2013
FROM THE EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 6th NOVEMBER 2013
To the people of Mexico and the world
To the compañer@s adherents to the sixth declaration of the Lacandon Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To national and international human rights defenders
To public opinion
Compañeros and compañeras, receive combative greetings of solidarity from the people of San Sebastián Bachajón.
We inform you that yesterday, November 5, 2013, at approximately 1 pm, the compañero from our organization, Herminio Estrada Gómez, the 18 year old son of our compañero Bartolo Estrada Silvano, was kidnapped in the community of Xanil 2nd Section, in the Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, by the following: Santiago Álvaro Moreno, government-supporting deputy ejidal Commissioner and neighbour of the community Xanil 2nd Section; Juan Álvaro Moreno Xanil from the community of Xanil 2nd section; Manuel Jiménez Moreno from the community of Pamalha; and Santiago Álvaro Gómez from Xanil 2nd Section, they also took his Pointer vehicle. So far they have held him incommunicado and we do not know whether he is in good physical condition and health, nor do they want to hand him over to the relevant Public Ministry in case he is being accused of a crime, but they are asking for money in exchange for his freedom.
These people already have a history of bad behaviour; Álvaro Moreno and Jiménez Moreno were part of the armed group which evicted our compañeros from the ticket booth on February 2, 2011. They are violent and serious criminals who have no respect for anyone. These criminal individuals also fabricated crimes against our compañeros Miguel Vázquez Deara, now free, and Antonio Estrada Estrada, a prisoner in Playas de Catazajá. They participated in his arrest with the state preventative and specialized police
On November 5th, 2013, a complaint was filed against these four people in the Indigenous Public Ministry of Bachajón, because what they are doing is very serious: without any right they take away our compañero’s freedom and his little car, but there is still no solution because our compañero continues to be deprived of his freedom, we ask them to remain aware of the situation of our compañero.
We demand that the bad government guarantees the life and immediate release of our compañero Herminio Estrada Gomez.
Never again a Mexico without us.
From the northern zone of Chiapas, receive a hug from the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón.
Attentively
Land and Freedom!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for Political Prisoners!
Juan Vazquez Guzman Lives, the Bachajón Struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous lands!
****************************************************************
The kidnapping of an 18-Year old youth in San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, is denounced
** Ejidatarios, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, report threats
** They point to four people as responsible for the action; they are holding him incommunicado and asking for money for his freedom
Hermann Bellinghausen,
La Jornada
Thursday, November 7th, 2013
San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas, November 6th, 2013
Ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, in Chilón municipality, denounced the kidnapping of a young man in Xanil community, of the same ejido, this Tuesday. The incidents occurred around 1:00 PM, when four individuals took away Herminio Estrada Gómez, aged 18.
“So far they have held him incommunicado and we do not know whether he is in good physical condition and health; nor do they want to hand him over to the relevant Public Ministry –in case he is being accused of a crime–, but they are asking for money in exchange for his freedom,” stressed the ejidatarios, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, who have recently been threatened and harassed by pro-government ejidal authorities.
The complainants identify as the kidnappers: Santiago Álvaro Moreno, deputy ejidal commissioner and a neighbour from the community of Xanil 2nd Section, along with Juan Álvaro Moreno and Santiago Álvaro Gómez, and also Manuel Jiménez Moreno from the community of Pamalha. “They also took away his Pointer vehicle,” they add.
“These people already have a history of bad behaviour. Álvaro Moreno and Jiménez Moreno were part of the armed group which evicted our compañeros from the ticket booth on February 2, 2011. They are violent and serious criminals who have no respect for anyone. These criminal individuals also fabricated crimes against our compañeros Miguel Vázquez Deara, now free, and Antonio Estrada Estrada, a prisoner in Playas de Catazajá. They participated in his arrest with the state preventative and specialized police.”
The ejidatarios of the Sixth state that on November 5th “a complaint was filed against these four people in the Indigenous Public Ministry of Bachajón, because what they are doing is very serious: without any right they take away our compañero’s freedom and his little car, but there is still no solution because our compañero continues to be deprived of his freedom.”
They demand that the state government guarantee the life and immediate freedom of the young Estrada Gómez.
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/11/07/politica/019n1pol
**********************************************************************
The organisation of a violent eviction of indigenous Tzeltales from a gravel quarry is denounced
Adherents to the Sixth accuse the ejidal commissioner
Hermann Bellinghausen
La Jornada
Wednesday November 6, 2013
San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas, November 5.
The Tzeltal ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, denounced that the ejidal commissioner and “pro-government political party supporter”, Alejandro Moreno Gómez, and the chairman of the Vigilance Commission, Samuel Díaz Guzmán, ” by occupation a charro (1) teacher”, are organising “a violent eviction at any time from our gravel (2) quarry, Nah Chawuk, which we recently opened as an organization and as ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, to benefit the people in general.”
They argue that the “opening” of the gravel quarry, on September 24th, was “an exercise of our rights as indigenous people and ejidatarios to control and protect our territory, and in response to the mismanagement of the main gravel quarry which to date remains in the hands of the bad government, because the former ejidal commissioner, Francisco Guzmán Jiménez (aka the Goyito), gave it to them along with the lands from which we have been dispossessed since February 2nd, 2011, and where the bad government built a toll booth which is administered by the National Commission of Natural Protected Areas.” This is on the access road to the busy tourist site of Agua Azul.
The indigenous claim to have knowledge that the government-supporting ejidal authorities “are constantly travelling to Tuxtla Gutierrez to tell the government to use public force to evict us from our Nah Chawuk gravel quarry, saying that this quarry is the main quarry and is now in the hands” of the government.
So far they “have not succeeded in bringing the police to beat up our brothers and sisters who are bravely and with dignity working collectively in Nah Chawuk.” For this reason, the government supporters “are seeking together to carry out an eviction from our gravel quarry, like they did on February 2, 2011, with the same people of Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, with the full support, funding and authorization of Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, current municipal president of Chilón, who entered with an armed group to displace our compañeros who had been working in the toll booth built by our organization since September 2009.”
They maintain that they will not allow themselves to be humiliated and discriminated against for their struggle and organization. “We want to continue being a community, we want to defend our culture and identity, we want to remain who we are, like our late compañero Juan Vazquez Guzman said, we will keep fighting no matter what happens, we are not afraid; our organization does not seek confrontation,” but it is “the bad government and the pro-government ejidal authorities who only seek to destroy the organization, to avoid any obstacle to selling the land and making money for their own personal gain. They are the true provokers of violence in our community and they seek to ensure that there is always division, because they do not want the people to unite against their corruption and their looting of our territory.”
The ejidatarios of the Sexta demand the immediate release of two of their compañeros from San Sebastian, Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Demeza Jiménez, “unjustly detained” in Playas de Catazajá and El Amate, as well as of Alejandro Díaz Sántiz, from Solidarity with the Voice of el Amate, imprisoned in San Cristóbal de las Casas. They “joyfully” greet their compañero Alberto Patishtán Gómez, “who managed to bring down the walls of the prison, and who is now happily in the company of his family.” They also welcome the international campaign of solidarity with their defence of their territory, convoked by the UK Zapatista Solidarity Network and Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York.
(1) Charro – a trade union leader appointed by, and supporting, the government
(2) Aggregate
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/11/06/index.php?section=politica&article=014n2pol
******************************************************************
Ejido San Sebastian Bachajón denounces risk of violent eviction from Nah Chawuk stone quarry, 3rd November, 2013
FROM THE EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 3 NOVEMBER 2013
To the people of Mexico and the world
To the compañer@s adherents to the sixth declaration of the Lacandon Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the Network for Solidarity and against Repression
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To the UK Zapatista Solidarity Network
To national and international human rights defenders
To public opinion
Compañeros and compañeras, receive a combative greeting from the children, women, men and elders of the community of San Sebastián Bachajón, in these days which are sacred to our people, during which we remember our dead who are resting in the arms of our mother earth. We joyfully greet our compañero Alberto Patishtan Gómez who managed to bring down the walls of the prison, and who is now happily in the company of his family.
We denounce that the pro-government political party supporter and ejidal commissioner for San Sebastián Bachajón, by name Alejandro Moreno Gómez, and the chairman of the Vigilance Commission of the same ejido, Samuel guzman diaz, by occupation a charro[i] teacher, are organizing, with their people from the political parties, a violent eviction at any time from our gravel[ii] quarry, Nah Chawuk, which we recently opened as an organization and as ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, to benefit the people in general.
The opening of the Nah Chawuk gravel quarry is an exercise of our rights as indigenous people and ejidatarios to control and protect our territory, and in response to the mismanagement of the main gravel quarry which to date remains in the hands of the bad government, because the former ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez (aka the Goyito) gave it to them along with the lands from which we have been dispossessed since February 2nd, 2011, and where the bad government built a toll booth which is administered by the National Commission of Natural Protected Areas and where they also have Francisco Guzmán Jiménez working as a minion.
We know that Alejandro Moreno Gómez and Samuel guzman diaz are constantly travelling to Tuxtla Gutierrez to tell the government to use public force to evict us from our Nah Chawuk gravel quarry, saying that this quarry is the main quarry and is now in the hands of the bad government, but this is a pure lie and they are tricks by the government-supporting ejidal authorities, who so far have not succeeded in bringing the police to beat up our brothers and sisters who are bravely and with dignity working collectively in Nah Chawuk. For this reason, people from the ejido are seeking together to carry out an eviction from our gravel quarry, like they did on February 2, 2011, with the same people of Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, with the full support, funding and authorization of Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, current municipal president of Chilón, who entered with an armed group to displace our compañeros who had been working in the toll booth built by our organization since September 2009, and who stole building materials and cash.
We hold fully responsible for any aggression, threat, or attack on the life and integrity of our compañeros who work and care for the Nah Chawuk gravel quarry, the following: Alejandro Moreno Gómez, pro-government ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajon; the chairman of the Vigilance Commission of San Sebastián Bachajón, Samuel díaz guzmán, by occupation also a charro teacher; Francisco Guzman Jimenez (aka the Goyito ) former officialist ejidal commissioner of San Sebastián Bachajón, currently a minion working in the toll booth of the bad government; the mayor of Chilón, Leonardo Rafael Guirao Aguilar; Manuel Velasco Coello, the Chiapas state governor, and Enrique Peña Nieto, president of the republic.
We are not going to take one step back in our struggle, nor will we allow ourselves to be humiliated and discriminated against in our struggle and organization, because we want to continue being a community, we want to defend our culture and identity, we want to remain who we are, like our late compañero Juan Vazquez Guzman said, we will keep fighting no matter what happens, we are not afraid, our organization does not seek confrontation, but it is the bad government and the pro-government ejidal authorities who only seek to destroy the organization, to avoid any obstacle to selling the land and making money for their own personal gain. They are the true provokers of violence in our community and they seek to ensure that there is always division, because they do not want the people to unite against their corruption and their looting of our territory.
We demand the immediate release of our colleagues ANTONIO ESTRADA ESTRADA, unjustly imprisoned in Playas de Catazajá, Chiapas and MIGUEL DEMEZA JIMENEZ in El Amate in Cintalapa de Figueroa. Also of compañero Alejandro Díaz Santiz, from solidarity with the voice of el amate, held in cereso number 5 in San Cristobal de las casas, Chiapas .
We welcome with joy the campaign of solidarity through sending letters to the authorities of the bad government, proposed by the UK Zapatista Solidarity Network and the compañeros and compañeras of Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York, we support this work and ask all our compañeros y compañeras from Mexico and the world for their valuable support.
Never again a Mexico without us.
From the northern zone of Chiapas, receive a hug from the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón.
Attentively
Land and Freedom!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for Political Prisoners!
Juan Vazquez Guzman Lives, the Bachajón Struggle continues!
No to the dispossession of indigenous lands!
[i] Charro – a trade union leader appointed by, and supporting, the government
[ii] Aggregate
******************************************************************
Request to write a letter in support of San Sebastián Bachajón
From the UK Zapatista Solidarity Network: A suggestion for a letter in support of the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón
To all:
Groups, collectives, organisations and individuals, adherents to the Sixth
National and international human right organisations
Alternative media
People of good heart in Mexico and throughout the world
Compañeras and Compañeros,
To mark the passing of 6 months since the brutal assassination of compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán on 24th April, 2013, we are sending a request to write a letter in support of the ejidatarios, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, from San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, Mexico, whose dignified struggle continues.
The following letter is ready to print out and send in protest against the dispossession of their lands and to demand justice for their murdered leader Juan Vázquez Guzmán. At the end you will find the names and addresses of some government officials it can be sent to. It is only necessary to add the date, the recipient and your name and contact information. You can of course write your own letter if you prefer.
You may also wish to send or deliver the letter to your nearest Mexican government office, embassy or consulate, as well as to the media and other organizations. It is better to send the letter by post rather than email wherever possible.
Thank you.
We send you all greetings and an embrace
The UK Zapatista Solidarity Network
Here is the letter:
To ………………………… Date …………………
Dear Sirs
Re: The dispossession of the common lands of the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón and the assassination of their community leader Juan Vázquez Guzmán.
24th October, 2013, marks the commemoration of six months having passed since the community leader and human rights defender from the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón in Chiapas, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, was shot down in the doorway of his home on 24th April, 2013. Since that time there has been no evidence of any effective investigation into his murder, and neither the material nor the intellectual authors of the crime have been identified or punished. It seems to be another example of the impunity which so often prevails in the case of crimes against the indigenous peoples of Mexico.
This assassination, together with the repression being experienced by the indigenous Tseltal inhabitants of this community, forms part of a violent campaign to displace the ejidatarios from their ancestral lands and territory in order to construct a luxury upmarket tourist development.
We wish to express our profound concerns at the failure to adequately investigate this crime and at the ongoing campaign of harassment, dispossession and criminalisation being conducted by the three levels of government, and their allies in big business, against the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, with the use of state police and military forces and locally recruited paramilitary groups, which has been underway since 2007.
On 3rd November 2013, the ejidatarios denounced the risk of “a violent eviction at any time from our gravel quarry, Nah Chawuk, which we recently opened as an organization and as ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, to benefit the people in general.” We assert their right as indigenous people to open this gravel quarry in their territory and will hold the three levels of government responsible for any harm suffered by those who work there.
The judgement concerning the petition for amparo 274/2011 of the Seventh District Court in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, presented by the people of Bachajón against the arbitrary deprivation of their common lands following the mass arrest in February 2011, and in favour of the protection of their territory and collective rights, has been handled with a disturbing lack of impartiality and independence. This demonstrates a shocking lack of respect for indigenous peoples, contrary to their rights established under ILO Convention 169 concerning Indigenous and Tribal Peoples, and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, both of which have been signed by the Mexican government. The ejidatarios have asked the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation to address this case, and have also asked the Third Collegiate Tribunal in Tuxtla Gutiérrez to study the Appeal Hearing 274/2013 and, in accordance with its powers, to ask the highest court in the land to resolve the request for amparo from the indigenous Tseltales; therefore we expect the court to treat the ejidatarios with fairness and justice, as is their right.
The repression being endured by the ejidatarios, as a result of their resistance and their defence of their territory and the natural resources of the area, forced them, on 26th May, 2013, to take their case to the Inter-American Human Rights Commission, based in Washington DC, in order to safeguard their rights and the integrity of their territory, and to protest the arbitrary deprivation of the life of Juan Vázquez Guzmán. We insist that it is essential and fundamental to guarantee the safety and security of those who seek to defend the communally held lands of indigenous peoples against plunder and dispossession.
Finally we call for the immediate release of Alejandro Díaz Santiz, from Solidarity with the Voice of El Amate.
We therefore demand:
- A full and fair investigation into the material and intellectual authors of the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, and punishment of those responsible
- Respect for the fundamental human rights of the indigenous Tseltal peoples of San Sebastián Bachajón, and guarantees for their security and integrity
- Respect and guarantees for their right to the full use and enjoyment of their territory
- Respect for their right to self-determination and the construction of their autonomy
- We demand that the President of the Council of the Federal Judiciary, Minister Juan N. Silva Meza, guarantee a fair trial and an effective resolution to the Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón in the development of amparo 274/2011 of the index of the Seventh District Court in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas to protect the Tzeltal indigenous territory, which has recently for the second time had the procedure reviewed by the Third Collegiate Tribunal in Tuxtla Gutiérrez
- An end to the plunder and dispossession, the theft of commons, the militarisation of the area, and to the threats and violence being experienced
- The immediate release of Alejandro Díaz Santiz
We will continue to monitor closely any developments in the area, and to offer the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón and the family of Juan Vázquez Guzmán our total support.
Respectfully
………………………..
Letter in Spanish here:
Addresses:
Ministro Juan N. Silva Mesa
Consejo de la Judicatura Federal
Insurgentes Sur 2417, San Ángel. Álvaro Obregón. C.P. 01000, México D.F.
+52 (55) 5490-8000 extensión 1072
Correo: luis.angulo.jacobo@correo.cjf.gob.mx, presidenciacjf@correo.cjf.gob.mx
Lic. Enrique Peña Nieto
Presidente de la República
Residencia Oficial de los Pinos
Casa Miguel Alemán
Col. San Miguel Chapultepec,
C.P. 11850, México DF
Tel: (52.55) 2789.1100 Fax: (52.55) 5277.2376
Lic. Miguel Ángel Osorio Chong
Secretario de Gobernación
Bucareli 99, 1er. Piso, Col. Juárez,
Del. Cuauhtémoc,
C.P. 06600 México D.F.
Fax: (52 55) 50933414;
Correo: secretario@segob.gob.mx
Lic. Manuel Velasco Coello
Gobernador Constitucional del Estado de Chiapas
Palacio de Gobierno del Estado de Chiapas, 1er Piso
Av. Central y Primera Oriente, Colonia Centro, C.P. 29009
Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, México
Fax: +52 961 61 88088 – + 52 961 6188056
Extensión 21120. 21122;
Correo: secparticular@chiapas.gob.mx
Lic. Oscar Eduardo Ramírez Aguilar
Secretario General de Gobierno del Estado de Chiapas
Palacio de Gobierno del Estado de Chiapas, 2do Piso
Av. Central y Primera Oriente, Colonia Centro, C.P. 29009
Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, México
Conmutador: + 52 (961) 61 2-90-47, 61 8-74-60
Extensión: 20003;
Correo: secretario@sgg.chiapas.gob.mx
Lic. Raciel López Salazar
Procuraduría General de Justicia de Chiapas
Libramiento Norte Y Rosa Del Oriente, No. 2010, Col. El Bosque
C.P. 29049 Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas
Conmutador: 01 (961) 6-17-23-00. Teléfono: + 52 (961) 61 6-53-74, 61 6-53-76, 61 6-57-24,
61 6-34-50
Correo: raciel.lopez@pgje.chiapas.gob.mx
Lic. Leonardo Rafael Guirao Aguilar
Presidente Municipal de Chilón, Chiapas
Domicilio Conocido S/N, Presidencia Municipal C.P. 29943
Chilón, Chiapas, México
Teléfonos: (01 919) 6710115, 6710230, 6710116, 6710030, Fax: 6710034
Correo: presidenciachilon@hotmail.com
Dr. Emilio Álvarez Icaza
Secretario Ejecutivo de la Comisión Interamericana de Derechos Humanos
1889 F Street, NW
Washington, D.C. 20006
USA
Fax 1-202-458-3992
Correo: cidhdenuncias@oas.org
Javier Hernández Valencia
Representante de la Oficina en México del Alto Comisionado
de Naciones Unidas para los Derechos Humanos
Alejandro Dumas No 165
Col. Polanco.
Del. Miguel Hidalgo
C.P 11560, México D.F.
Tel: (52-55) 5061-6350
Fax: (52-55) 5061-6358
Correo: quejasoacnudhmexico@ohchr.org ; oacnudh@ohchr.org
Sr Alejandro Ives Estivill Castro
Mexican Ambassador to the UK
Embassy of Mexico
16 St George Street
London
W1S 1FD
******************************************************************
San Sebastián Bachajón, 6 months after the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán
“Although the rulers do not like it, we will continue defending our territory because this is where we come from, and we are not leaving despite their repression and corruption” say the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, who denounce the murder with impunity of their leader Juan Vázquez Guzmán, and request the intervention of the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation to protect their rights and the integrity of their territory.
“Here we continue in struggle, resisting with hope to defend our lands from dispossession by this accursed government which only wants to sow terror and destruction in our communities”, the indigenous Tzeltal ejidatarios (communal landholders) from San Sebastián Bachajón, in the northern region of the state of Chiapas, Mexico, stated in June 2013. “The bad governments kill and imprison those who struggle for better living conditions for their people, For this reason, two months ago they ordered the assassination of our compañero, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, by their hired assassins while he was resting quietly at home, the treacherous government wickedly ordered his murder to put an end to our struggle, but they were wrong, because we are here, we are staying here and we are not going to leave our land which is the birthplace of our mothers and fathers, of our grandfathers and grandmothers who also fought and gave their lives for the mother earth.”
With this clear message, the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle re-confirmed that their struggle continues, despite the brutal murder of their traditional leader, the social activist and human rights defender Juan Vázquez Guzmán, on 24th April, 2013, and the fact that neither the instigators nor the perpetrators of the killing have been identified or punished.
They explain their struggle: “We fight to defend our territory from dispossession by the government to impose an ecotourist megaproject”. They warn that “the bad government” uses public forces, such as the state preventive police, the army, and the federal police, to terrorize communities and so imposes terror to achieve its goals. “We can see that the hand of the government has great aspirations for the natural resources of the ejido and wants to finish off the organization politically, because it does not want to have resistance, so that the people will easily hand over their land for the building of large luxury hotels, golf courses and aeroplane runways for wealthy tourists”, they stated on 9th September.
“Our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán is an example of struggle and of love for his people, he gave his life for his people, he struggled for his people to be free from the oppression and the abuse of power of the bad government, he struggled to recover the territory which had been seized”, the Tzetzals confirmed. It has not been easy for the ejidatarios after the devastating murder. They have suffered relentless violence and repression from the 3 levels of government, and from paramilitaries supporting the PRI political party, since 2007.
After Juan’s assassination, they received an avalanche of support, with pronouncements, letters and declarations issued from groups, collectives, human rights organisations and other representatives of national and international civil society. To coincide with Juan’s birthday on 25th June, the “Week of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, The Struggle of Bachajón Continues” was organised, an international campaign co-ordinated and publicised by a worldwide network of solidarity groups.
Honouring and keeping the memory of Juan is a powerful impetus to the people of San Sebastián Bachajón to continue in resistance, defending their territory in the ways he taught them; they have done this using several means: through one of their main tools of struggle – the roadblock, through symbolic actions asserting their right to live in their territory, through continuing to campaign for the release of their prisoners, through legal means by promoting their amparo, and through joining their resistance with that of other indigenous people throughout Mexico. “Our resistance”, they say, “is for dignity and autonomy, because we want to continue being who we are”.
The roadblock and the gravel bank
The two main traditional acts of protest of the Bachajón ejidatarios have been the taking over of the ticket booth and the roadblock. On 2nd July 2013, they held a massive “informative roadblock” of the main road from Palenque to Ocosingo, near the turning for the Agua Azul waterfalls. Big banners across the highway proclaimed “The bad government is responsible for the death of compa Juan Vázquez Guzmán.” “No to the plunder of our lands!” “Freedom now for our prisoners Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Demeza Jiménez!” “Freedom now for Alberto Patishtán and the other Chiapas political prisoners!” “Long live the peoples in resistance and the Zapatista Caracoles!”
The Tzeltals handed out flyers in Spanish and English, for many tourists travel on this busy road. Through a megaphone they read their communiqué calling for justice not impunity, for respect for their territory, and declaring that they are “ready to give our lives for our mother earth and our struggle, just as our compañero Juan, heart of our struggle and our people, did”. The ejidatarios stated that Juan Vázquez Guzmán denounced the networks of corruption and complicities of the government “which aim to displace the people of San Sebastián Bachajón from their land and to dismantle our organization in resistance”.
Along with the ticket booth, another long-term focus of conflict between the ejidatarios adherents to the Sixth and the government supporters has been the gravel bank, source of material for construction, “destroyed by the ejidal commissioner through uncontrolled exploitation”. It was thus symbolic of another step forward in their struggle, when the “women and men of Bachajón” announced in their communiqué of 26th September, 2013, that their organization had made an agreement to begin working a new gravel bank “to meet the needs of the ejidatarios and for the collective benefit of the people… We hold the governments responsible for any aggression, threats and repression which they try to do to impede our work as an organization and as ejidatarios on the Chawuk Nah gravel bank.”
Prisoners
As the well-known case of Alberto Patishtán has demonstrated, Mexican prisons contain many indigenous prisoners detained unjustly on fabricated charges made in a language they do not understand, with their basic rights violated, and their due process not complied with. In April 2013, there were 3 Tzeltal prisoners from Bachajón, all of whom had been tortured to make them confess to crimes they did not commit, and all of whom, according to the Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Human Rights Centre, were imprisoned “to undermine the actions for the defence of territory that the ejido has been undertaking for several years”. There was great celebration, therefore, when one of them, Miguel Vázquez Deara, was released on June 26th, 2013, due to “violations of his rights to an adequate defence”.
On 13th August, 2013, the prisoner Miguel Demeza Jiménez was granted an amparo (legal protection) in relation to the detention order against him, because, in the words of his lawyer, Ricardo Lagunes Gasca, “the detention order violates Article 16 of the Constitution, as the El Amate judge did not duly point out the foundation and the legal and logical reasons proving probable criminal responsibility”. “This decision”, the lawyer continued, “establishes that he has been wrongfully imprisoned for nearly three years”. The remaining prisoner, Antonio Estrada Estrada, filed a petition for amparo on 30th September 2013 against his sentence of seven years in prison, for the offences of assault and organised crime, on the grounds of violation of his human rights. During his detention Antonio was not granted the assistance of a lawyer and a translator who knew his language and culture, and he was tortured, to force him to sign an incriminating statement, by the same police officers who had arrested him, alleging that he had assaulted them.
Miguel Demeza Jiménez and Antonio Estrada Estrada currently remain imprisoned, the first in El Amate and the second in Playas de Catazajá, and the campaign for their freedom continues.
Seeking the Amparo
On February 2nd, 2011, local authorities evicted the ejidatarios of Bachajón from the toll booth at the entrance to the Agua Azul Waterfalls, the area where the government plans to develop, with multinational corporations, a luxury tourist complex to rival Cancun. At this time, 117 people were arbitrarily detained, and the authorities took possession of 2,590 square metres of the collectively owned lands of the ejido. This dispossession, their lawyer warned “is only the beginning of the plunder that is to come”.
In order to legally prove their rights to this land, a representative of the ejidatarios presented a petition for amparo, against the arbitrary deprivation of their common use lands, before the courts in March 2011. After nearly two years, the petition was dismissed in January 2013, but the ejidatarios and their lawyer persisted, and the decision was overturned in May 2013. On July 22nd, the case of amparo 274/2011 came up before the same judge, José del Carmen Constantino Avendaño, who had dismissed it in January, and he again ruled against Bachajón. The ejidatarios denounced the judge as a corrupt crook “who sells his dignity and honour”, and continued to defend their amparo.
On 1st August they filed an appeal for review against the decision, which is currently being processed. They also asked the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation “to consider our amparo and protect our territory”. They cited as precedent the “protective decision” to grant amparo 631/2012 to the Yaqui tribe of Sonora, concerning the theft of the water from the Yaqui River by the state government through the Independence Aqueduct.
The National Indigenous Congress (CNI)
On 17th and 18th August, 2013, the Tata Juan Chávez Alonso Seminar, convoked by the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) and the CNI itself, a national meeting to relaunch the Congress, was held in San Cristóbal de las Casas. At this crucial gathering, members of over 32 indigenous peoples, nations and tribes from 19 states met to “recognize, support and encourage the struggle for autonomy and self-determination of all the peoples who make up the CNI”, because “the bad governments and transnational corporations” rely on “paramilitary groups to impose extractive megaprojects”. Among the 29 demands they issued was “the release of our imprisoned compañeros from the Tzeltal community of Bachajón, Chiapas, Miguel Demeza Jiménez and Antonio Estrada Estrada”.
Following this seminar, as the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón explained in a communiqué on September 9th, “we know that we are not alone because there are many peoples who are fighting with us for our lives and dignity; we talked and we met together at the Tata Juan Chávez Alonso seminar of the National Indigenous Congress, we hear our struggles and we see that we have a common enemy who wants to destroy our cultures and seize our territories, so we also see that we must continue to strengthen our organizations, our cultures and our autonomy which will enable the transformation of this world which is held hostage by the capitalist mentality.”
In their contribution to the gathering, the adherents to the Sixth Declaration stressed to all the indigenous peoples present that “we embrace your struggles and make them our own”, because “Those from above give orders to destroy us, our peoples, and order the destruction of all that gives us life, building dams, ecotourism projects, wind parks, stealing the rivers through pipes, stealing and polluting our seeds, opening mines, and to achieve this they order the killing of our brothers, dignified men and women who fight to defend the Mother Earth, they imprison us, torture us and make us disappear, but they forget that we are one, that we are not alone and that as children of the earth our roots are still alive in spite of all the death that they offer us.”
Selective assassination
The assassination with complete impunity of indigenous leaders in resistance to the territorial plunder and displacement arising from neoliberal megaprojects is one of the established tactics of governments looking to destroy opposition. In Mexico, the community defender and environmental activist Noé Vázquez Ortiz was stoned to death on August 2nd, 2013, as he was preparing the ceremony to begin the 10thanniversary meeting of the of the Mexican Movement of those Affected by Dams and in Defence of Rivers (MAPDER), in the municipality of Amatlán de los Reyes, Veracruz. Héctor Regalado Jiménez, opponent of the wind-energy projects and sympathizer of the Popular Assembly of the Juchiteco People (APPJ), died on 1st August 2013 in the city of Juchitán de Zaragoza from the injuries from the six gunshot wounds he received on 21st July.
Two Zapotec community leaders opposed to the Canadian silver and gold mining project at San José del Progreso in the south of Oaxaca were murdered in 2012; Bernardo Vásquez and Bernardo Méndez were both shot dead. In Chiapas, the indigenous leader from the municipality of Chicomuselo, Mariano Abarca Robledo, organiser of the communities demanding the closure of the barite mine operated by the Canadian mining company Blackfire, was shot dead in 2009. The list is endless.
Impunity and struggle
For the people of Bachajon, the memory of their assassinated compañero remains both an inspiration and a responsibility, to continue in resistance, in defence of their ancestral commonly owned land and territory. “The memory of compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán is our strength as an organization to keep fighting and defending our territory from plunder by the bad government”, they affirmed in a communiqué. “The bad government and the lords of money ordered the killing of our brother Juan on the 24th of April this year by some hitmen who remain free, surely enjoying the money that the government paid them to do their job”. They regret that “so far this crime of the bad government remains unpunished.”
In their 9th September communique, the ejidatarios hold responsible “for the dispossession of our land, for the cowardly murder of our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán who fell in the struggle for the defence of his people, and for our political prisoners Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Demeza Jiménez, the president of the republic Enrique Peña Nieto, the Chiapas state governor Manuel Velasco Coello, the former Secretary General of government Noe Castañón Leon, the mayor of Chilón Leonardo Guirao Aguilar and the political agents of the three levels of government, as well as the former ejidal commissioner and the current officialist ejidal commissioner”. They continue: “We are not going to allow the government to do as it pleases with our people and our territory. Our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán gave his life for the people and the land, which is why his blood must not be shed in vain, because we will defend it whatever the cost, it is our right and the government must respect it, enough of so much injustice and abuse from the bad government.”
“The struggle of our people of San Sebastian Bachajón”, they told the National Indigenous Congress, “is to conserve our indigenous territory which we inherited from our ancestors, it is where we live, it gives us life and identity. We are defending our land with our lives if necessary, against the ambition of the government and of the lords of money who want to build luxury hotels, golf courses and runways for rich tourists, at the cost of the exploitation, marginalization and discrimination of our people; faced with the defence we have mounted against these projects the government has had only one answer: repression, imprisonment and death”.
They finish: “although the rulers do not like it, we will continue defending our territory because this is where we come from, and we are not leaving despite their repression and corruption, we will defend it as our grandfathers and grandmothers did until we achieve victory, as our beloved compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán, cowardly assassinated by the bad government, has taught us.”
This article was originally published in Spanish by Desinformémonos on 21st October, 2013: http://desinformemonos.org/2013/10/los-ejidatarios-de-bachajon-a-contracorriente-de-la-impunidad-y-los-jueces/
*****************************************************************************************
Denunciation from Antonio Estrada, Political Prisoner from Bachajón
Originally published on October 20, 2013
*************************************************************************************
Bachajón defends its territory in the courts
The victories obtained in the legal sphere by other peoples, such as the Yaqui tribe and the Wirrárika, give encouragement to the ejidatarios[i]. “This not only benefits them, but also other peoples,” says the lawyer of the Tzeltales.
JAIME QUINTANA GUERRERO
The ejidatarios of Bachajón continue the defence of their territory by legal means and through the link with other indigenous peoples, explains their lawyer, Ricardo Lagunes. The murder of Juan Vázquez, in March[ii] 2013, did not stop the struggle of the Tzeltales. “The organization is not about taking power. So they cannot so easily buy and destroy them”, says the lawyer.
To get access to the ecotourism centre at Agua Azul it is necessary to pass through the ejido of Bachajón. Therefore, since the seventies, the community has located a booth there to sell tickets and obtain some resources for the community. However, “interests were created and the community was divided, with two kinds of authorities: the official and the autonomous, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle”, the lawyer recalls.
The autonomous authorities decided to defend their territory against dispossession, but the state intervened “creating division and making clear the interests of big business”.
The dispossession began on February 2nd, 2011, with an eviction by the police. The lawyer for the ejidatarios states that “the resistance of peoples continues with the legal strategy, social mobilization and political statements”, and denounces that the government wants to wipe them out with a destabilizing group.
The Secretariat of the Environment and Natural Resources (SEMARNAT) plays an important role in the dispossession of the land, through the Protected Areas Commission. The agency, explains Lagunes, “illegally altered a plan of the Agua Azul area, which was originally allocated to be part of the ejido. This is shown by a decree issued by the Official Journal of the Federation in 1980, which does not correspond to the coordinates of SEMARNAT”.
The lawyer reports that despite the 1992 amendments to the Constitution – which attack social ownership of land – ejidos are social territories which are used for defence against large private companies. For this reason, he continues, “the violence is great. The state deploys its economic and police apparatus to infiltrate these people and to try to manage them”.
“In Bachajón we are in the legal struggle right now,” said Lagunes, the human rights defender. “We have an amparo[iii] under its second review. We have asked the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation (SCJN) to consider the case”. The lawyer said that perhaps in six months they will have an answer.
The victories obtained in the legal sphere by other peoples, such as the Yaqui tribe and the Wirrárika people, give encouragement to the ejidatarios. “This not only benefits them, but also other peoples,” says the lawyer.
The case was also submitted to the Inter-American Human Rights Commission, for dispossession, criminalization and the arbitrary deprivation of the life of Juan Vázquez. The complainants considered that “there are no guarantees to preserve the life of those who defend the territory,” claims Lagunes.
The defender alleges that the government of Manuel Velasco Coello is a continuation of the policies of the former governor Juan Sabines, but, he remarks, the assassination of the ejidatario Juan Vázquez Guzmán does mark a before and an after. Following the murder, he recounts, a smear campaign began against the ejido leaders to divert attention from the case.
Lagunes recalls Juan Vázquez and how “people sought him out a lot for his skills and abilities to relate to the world of the Caxlanes[iv], to defend and translate the problems of the indigenous communities and to put them on the table of the authorities”.
In the six years of the state government of the Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD), “the repression was strong”, declares Lagunes. The government of Juan Sabines managed “a double discourse on human rights. The governor played a very perverse game portraying himself in the media as a guarantor and protector of human rights, while there were many prisoners in 2008 and 2009″. The lawyer added that “the bodies of law enforcement and justice administration showed their bias and lack of independence in solving these issues”.
Different peoples, the same strategy
Bachajón’s lawyer emphasised that the strategies of dispossession are the same throughout Mexico. “The government arrives, divides the communities, buys leaders or ejidatarios, undermines struggles, promotes one group and treats it as legitimate, represses, imprisons and kills those who do not agree with it”, the lawyer denounces.
With the death of Juan Vazquez, “the government thought that the people should be calm and quiet, since it was the most visible.” However, the ejidatarios carried on with their struggle, he says.
“The organization is not about taking power. So they cannot so easily buy and destroy them”, concludes the man who accompanies Bachajón.
Published 14th October, 2013
http://desinformemonos.org/2013/10/bachajon-defiende-su-territorio-en-los-tribunales/
[i] Communal landholders
[ii] April 24th, 2013
[iii] Order for legal protection
[iv] White people, mestizos, non-indigenous
************************************************************************************
COMMUNIQUÉ FROM THE REBEL EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, SEPTEMBER 26th, 2013
EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON ADHERENT TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 26 SEPTEMBER 2013
To the people of Mexico and the world
To the compañer@s adherents to the sixth declaration of the Lacandon Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the Network against Repression and for Solidarity
To national and international human rights defenders
To public opinion
Compañeros and compañeras, receive a combative greeting from the children, women, men and elders of the people of San Sebastián Bachajón. On September 24th we remembered our fallen compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán, 5 months after he was cowardly murdered by the bad government on the night of April 24th, 2013 when he was resting at home, the murderers shooting him with a firearm. The memory of compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán is our strength as an organization to keep fighting and defending our territory from plunder by the bad government which does not cease wanting to destroy our organization.
We inform you that our organization of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle has made an agreement to begin working a new gravel bank in the territory of San Sebastián Bachajón to meet the needs of the ejidatarios, the name this bank will carry is Nah Chawuk. Our idea comes from seeing so much repression from the bad government and the corruption and abuse from the ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez, together with the former ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, who destroyed the ejido’s gravel bank through uncontrolled exploitation and did not make themselves accountable to the ejidatarios for using the resource, they just put it in their purse and that of the politicians. These people who truly behave like organized criminals only seek their own personal gain and the people are an obstacle to them.
The new gravel bank Chawuk Nah will be for the benefit of all the people, not like Alejandro Moreno Gómez and the other corrupt commissioners do, who make money for their purse, they just exploit and profit from the mother earth while the people and the ejidatarios are discriminated against and completely marginalized by these bad authorities who do not seek the collective benefit, but only benefit their people from the political parties and people from the government who make their purses richer by making Mother Earth into a business. So as an organization of ejidatarios we determined to begin work on the Chawuk Nah gravel bank to meet the needs of ejidatarios and for the collective benefit of the people.
We hold the federal, state and municipal governments and also the ejidal government of Alejandro Moreno Gómez responsible for any aggression, threats and repression which they try to do to impede our work as an organization and as ejidatarios on the Chawuk Nah gravel bank.
We are now looking at how these corrupt authorities are buying the communications media of Cuarto Poder to publish lies and tarnish our organization, with information published on September 25, from an alleged journalist, by name Juan Sanchez, where it says that it is affecting the ecological reserve in the ejido and that it will cause confrontation between 7 thousand ejidatarios, but this is a lie because the ejidal map says that the hilly area is designated for a gravel bank, but Alejandro Moreno Gómez does not have the ejidal documents and only does what he is told to do by the bad government and Francisco Guzman Jimenez (aka the goyito); this is how pure falsehoods arise in order to suppress and destroy our organization, which is the only one which is struggling to defend the dignity of its people, because they have already sold themselves. In the ejido there were originally about 2 thousand ejidatarios, but the government has inflated the census of ejidatarios in the National Agrarian Registry to 4 thousand to better impose their frauds on the election of ejidal authorities. Our organization is peaceful and does not provoke confrontations, our organization defends the territory and the mother land from the capitalist projects of the bad government, this bad government and the ejidal authorities who obey them are the provocateurs, they generate violence in the ejido and are the murderers of social activists like Juan Vázquez Guzmán.
These bandits are the same ones who keep up the dispossession of our territory and who have illegally changed the coordinates of the decree of 1980 for the natural protected area of the waterfalls of Agua Azul in order to dispossess the ejido, with the police violating the law and human rights. The bad government does not like our organization to work independently without asking it for scraps and to live our autonomy without asking it for permission, it only wants to see us bent over and obedient like slaves.
We demand that the three levels of government respect our organization and our autonomy, we hold them responsible for any aggression, threats and harassment against our work and the compañeros and compañeras of the organization.
We demand the immediate release of our compañeros ANTONIO ESTRADA ESTRADA, unjustly imprisoned in Playas de Catazajá, Chiapas, and MIGUEL DEMEZA JIMENEZ, in El Amate in Cintalapa de Figueroa. We deplore the decision of the First Collegiate Circuit Court in Tuxtla Gutierrez not to release the compañero and social activist ALBERTO PATISHTÁN GOMEZ, but we will not rest until we achieve his freedom and that of our political prisoner compañeros.
Never again a Mexico without us
From the northern zone of Chiapas, receive a hug from the women and men of San Sebastian Bachajón.
Attentively
Land and Freedom!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for Political Prisoners!
Freedom for Alberto Patishtan Gomez!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón Struggle continues!
***************************************************************************
COMMUNIQUÉ FROM THE EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, SEPTEMBER 9th, 2013
EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON ADHERENT TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS. MEXICO
To the people of Mexico and the world
To the compañer@s adherents to the sixth declaration of the Lacandon Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Indigenous National Congress
To national and international human rights defenders
To the compañero political prisoner Alberto Patishtan Gómez
To public opinion
Compañeros and compañeras in struggle, our people of San Sebastián Bachajón raise our voices against the injustices of this bad government that seeks to destroy our peoples, our culture and territories. This bad government does not respect the diverse cultures of this country, it only wants to impose the culture of the market and of capitalism, with its reforms to the Constitution and the laws, privatizing the oil, the wind, the beaches, education, raising taxes, taking away workers’ rights and benefiting national and foreign corporations so that they can exploit natural resources at will with impunity, even at the cost of the lives of the peoples.
The law is not respected in this country by the officials of the bad government, what rules is the law of money and the power of the caciques, finqueros and entrepreneurs who have made the call to the political class and who see only their personal benefit and who obey interests contrary to the dignity of communities, peoples and society in general, those who work to live and to achieve dignified conditions in which to raise their families. In this country the majority of the population lives in poverty and unemployment, with only a few who live on stolen wealth and the exploitation of others, and who reproduce inequality and discrimination in order to remain rich at the expense of the lives of hundreds of thousands of people.
Our struggle as Tzeltal people is not for political or economic power, it is a struggle for dignity and autonomy, because we want to remain who we are, even though the government does not like this, even though they want us to change our ideas and thoughts, we are dignified and proud of the heritage of our grandfathers and grandmothers, because the nations and tribes who have lived in these sacred lands for hundreds of years have the right to be respected and to defend mother earth. But the bad government does not question or ask permission from the communities and towns about the projects or businesses that they say are for our benefit, it has no respect for our culture, because what it does is buy some authorities of our communities, such as the former ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez (aka the goyito ) and the current commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez, who do not understand struggle or love for their people, and it does business with them to divide the community, or orders the imprisonment or killing of social activists. It uses public forces, such as the state preventive police, the army and the federal police to terrorize communities and so imposes terror to achieve its goals.
The bad government has sown division in the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, by buying with money the ‘officialist’ [government-supporting] ejidal commissioners, who have been in office since 2007, this is why our movement of adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle of the Zapatista National Liberation Army arose, because we can see that the hand of the government has great aspirations for the natural resources of the ejido and wants to finish off the organization politically, because it does not want to have resistance, so that the people will easily hand over their land for the building of large luxury hotels, golf courses and aeroplane runways for rich tourists. The bad government has caused and continues to generate the problem of the dispossession in San Sebastián Bachajón using indigenous brothers to confront the resistance, but it is not a problem just between indigenous, as the bad government says, this is the same excuse as always, with which the government wants to wash its hands so that its corruption and true intentions will not be seen, just like it said when the Acteal massacre took place on December 22, 1997, and it is saying now about the displaced families from colonia Puebla, in the municipality of Chenalhó, Chiapas.
We hold responsible for the dispossession of our land, for the cowardly murder of our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán who fell in the struggle for the defence of his people, and for our political prisoners Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Demeza Jiménez, the president of the republic Enrique Peña Nieto, the Chiapas state governor Manuel Velasco Coello, the former Secretary General of government Noe Castañón Leon, the mayor of Chilón Leonardo Guirao Aguilar and the political agents of the three levels of government, as well as the former ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez (aka the goyito) and the current officialist ejidal commissioner, manipulated by the goyito, whose name is Alejandro Moreno Gómez.
Our organization is in struggle with the will to win victory in the defence of our people, we know that we are not alone because there are many peoples who are fighting with us for our lives and dignity; we talked and we met together at the Tata Juan Chávez Alonso seminar of the National Indigenous Congress, we hear our struggles and we see that we have a common enemy who wants to destroy our cultures and seize our territories, so we also see that we must continue to strengthen our organizations, our cultures and our autonomy which will enable the transformation of this world which is held hostage by the capitalist mentality.
We are not going to allow the government to do as it pleases with our people and our territory. Our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán gave his life for the people and the land, which is why his blood must not be shed in vain, because we will defend it whatever the cost, it is our right and the government must respect it, enough of so much injustice and abuse from the bad government.
We continue to defend our amparo 274/2011 from the Seventh District Judge in Tuxtla Gutierrez, because Alejandro Moreno Gómez and Francisco Guzmán Jiménez are getting false meeting minutes in order to throw out the amparo, without the signatures of the General Assembly of Ejidatarios, they are fabricating these minutes in obscurity with the complicity of the Secretary General of the State Government of Chiapas and other officials of the bad federal, state and municipal governments who advise them, but they have not been able to throw out the amparo despite the support of the Seventh District Judge Jose del Carmen Constantino Avendaño, from a family of caciques known for exploiting the indigenous, such as Constantino Kanter. Hence our request on August 20th, 2013, to the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation, that they consider our amparo and protect our territory.
We call on the First Collegiate Tribunal in Tuxtla Gutierrez that on September 12th, 2013, they order the release of our compañero and brother Alberto Patishtan Gomez, a social activist and defender of the rights of his people in El Bosque, not one more day in prison because he is innocent.
We demand the immediate release of our compañeros ANTONIO ESTRADA ESTRADA prisoner in Playas de Catazajá and MIGUEL DEMEZA JIMENEZ prisoner in El Amate; they were tortured and unjustly accused. Compañero Antonio was accused by 6 members of the state, specialized and federal police of wanting to attack them in the early morning of August 8th, 2011; these corrupt police kidnapped him on August 7th in the community of Sasamtik, municipality of Chilón, Chiapas, for being from our organization and this is why they fabricated his crime; they planted a discharged .38 calibre pistol and two machetes with which he allegedly assaulted the group of police who were traveling in their units; they tortured him for an entire day to make him plead guilty to all he was falsely accused of. Our compañero Miguel Demeza Jiménez is unjustly accused of robbery and kidnapping by the Special Prosecutor against Organized Crime and the Ocosingo ironmonger Emilio Adiel Argueta Ruiz and his friend from El Salvador Ruben Anibal Ramirez Monge. Compañero Miguel is innocent and is demonstrating it, because on August 13th he won an injunction which shows the serious human rights violations committed by the bad government.
Never again a Mexico without us,
From the northern zone of Chiapas, receive an embrace from the women and men of San Sebastian Bachajón,
Attentively
Land and Freedom!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for Political Prisoners!
Freedom for Alberto Patishtan Gomez!
Juan Vazquez Guzman Lives, the Bachajón Struggle continues!
***********************************************************************
Ejido Owners Accuse the “Bad Government” of Wanting to Eliminate Peoples and Territories
** They demand the liberation of two adherents to the Sixth Declaration
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
The ejido owners of San Sebastián Bachajón, municipality of Chilón, Chiapas, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, accused the “bad government” of “seeking to finish off our peoples and territories. It does not respect the country’s diverse cultures, it only wants to impose the culture of the market and of capitalism with its reforms of the Constitution and the laws privatizing the oil, the wind, the beaches, education, increasing taxes, taking away workers’ rights and benefiting national and foreign corporations.”
“The bad government does not respect” the law because “the money and power of caciques, finqueros and impresarios” rules, and they “obey interests contrary to the dignity of communities, peoples and society in general.”
They pointed out that their current resistance “as Tzeltal people” is not for political or economic power, “it is for dignity and autonomy, because we want to continue being who we are. Although the government does not like this and wants us to change our thinking, we are dignified and proud of the heritage of our grandparents.”
They again demanded the liberation of Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Demeza Jiménez, “tortured and unjustly accused.” Concerning the first, “six state, specialized and federal police accuse him of wanting to assault them in the early morning of August 8th, 2011.” Those agents had kidnapped him the previous evening in the community of Sasamtik, Chilón municipality, “for being from our organization.” They planted a discharged .38-calibre pistol and two machetes, with which he allegedly assaulted the police, who were traveling in their units. They “tortured him for a whole day to make him plead guilty.”
The second, Demeza Jiménez, accused of robbery and kidnapping, “is innocent and is demonstrating it, because on August 13th he won a protective order (amparo) which proves the grave violation of his human rights.”
The government “does not ask for permission from the communities about the projects or businesses that it says are for our benefit,” but rather “buys some authorities from our communities, like the ex ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez (Goyito) and the commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez, and it uses public force to intimidate us.”
The ejido owners maintain that the authorities: “have planted division by buying these commissioners, in office since 2007.” They warn that they will continue defending protective order (amparo) 274/2011, filed in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, because Moreno Gómez and Guzmán Jiménez “are introducing false acts of the assembly, without the signatures of the general assembly,” to get it thrown out, but they have not been successful. On August 20th, the ejido owners asked the Nation’s Supreme Court of Justice” “to study our protective order and protect our territory.”
——————————————————————
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Tuesday, September 10, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/09/10/politica/019n2pol
English translation by the Chiapas Support Committee for the: International Zapatista Translation Service
********************************************************************
EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON ADHERENT TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS. MEXICO. AUGUST 17, 2013
Compañeros and compañeras, receive our combative greetings to all the peoples and communities who struggle and resist with dignity, in Mexico and the world, against the capitalist exploitation of indigenous territories which seeks to own the land, air, water, forests, native seeds, and life itself.
We warmly greet students from the Zapatista Escuelita, the Indigenous National Congress and the compañeros and compañeras of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation.
We are indigenous Tseltal people from San Sebastian Bachajon, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, we fight to defend our territory from dispossession by the government to impose an ecotourist megaproject, and as indigenous people we make your struggle our own; we embrace the struggle for life that each of you undertakes from the place or space you come from, because all of us are here to build a better world for all.
We know that the lords of money and power are planning everywhere, day and night, how to end our world, wanting us and all we represent to disappear. We who are indigenous struggle to continue to be what we are, to build our own way of life and to conserve our territory, defending it from the ambition of those above, because to them we are only an obstacle to their being increasingly rich and powerful, because those who truly command are those who have power and money, the government is only their puppet, serving power and money and not the people.
Those from above give orders to destroy us, our peoples, and order the destruction of all that gives us life, building dams, ecotourism projects, wind parks, stealing the rivers through pipes, stealing and polluting our seeds, opening mines, and to achieve this they order the killing of our brothers, dignified men and women who fight to defend the Mother Earth, they imprison us, torture us and make us disappear, but they forget that we are one, that we are not alone and that as children of the earth our roots are still alive in spite of all the death that they offer us.
The struggle of our people of San Sebastian Bachajón is to conserve our indigenous territory which we inherited from our ancestors, it is where we live, it gives us life and identity. We are defending our land with our lives if necessary, against the ambition of the government and of the lords of money who want to build luxury hotels, golf courses and runways for rich tourists, at the cost of the exploitation, marginalization and discrimination of our people; faced with the defence we have mounted against these projects the government has had only one answer: repression, imprisonment and death.
Our brothers from San Sebastian Bachajon have been imprisoned, on the 3rd of February 2011, 117 of our compañeros were imprisoned; they were released in the same year thanks to the solidarity of all of you; still unjustly imprisoned are our compañeros Antonio Estrada Estrada in Playas de Catazajá, and Miguel Demeza Jiménez in El Amate, tortured and accused using fabricated evidence, violating their human rights because the justice of the bad government is not for the poor and the indigenous.
Another response from the bad government and the lords of money and power has been death, they ordered the killing of our brother Juan Vázquez Guzmán on the 24th of April this year, so far this crime of the bad government remains unpunished. Our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán is an example of struggle and of love for his people, he gave his life for his people, he struggled for his people to be free from the oppression and the abuse of power of the bad government, he struggled to recover the territory which had been seized, he always inspired the compañeros and compañeras to continue struggling and defending their land, he was always also closely following the legal work such as the amparo (order for legal protection) 274/2011 from the Seventh District Court, and he constantly denounced the politicians and corrupt judges who have until now favoured the dispossession.
In spite of so much repression our people continue resisting with the intention of gaining victory, as we were taught by our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán, cowardly murdered by the bad government.
Although the rulers do not like it, we will continue defending our territory because this is where we come from, and we are not leaving despite their repression and corruption, we will defend it as our grandfathers and grandmothers did until we achieve victory.
Freedom and Justice for ANTONIO ESTRADA ESTRADA, MIGUEL DEMEZA JIMENEZ, and ALBERTO PATISHTAN GOMEZ.
From the northern zone of Chiapas, receive an embrace from women and men of San Sebastian Bachajón.
Attentively
Land and Freedom!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom Political Prisoners!
Juan Vazquez Guzman Lives, the Bachajón Struggle continues!
****************************************************************
Ejidatarios from Chilón Take their Territorial Complaint to the SCJN
** They accuse the government of dispossession
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, August 24, 2013
The ejidatarios [communal landholders] from San Sebastián Bachajón, Chilón municipality, have agreed to take to the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation (SCJN) their case for the defence of their territory against impositions of the Chiapas government, backed by federal bodies, which have involved territorial dispossession of the indigenous, obeying plans for tourist exploitation in favour of the neighboring Agua Azul ejido, where the famous waterfalls of the same name are located.
Last August 20th, Mariano Moreno Guzmán, adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle from the aforementioned Tzeltal ejido, and his legal representative, Ricardo Lagunes Gasca, asked the SCJN “to officially exercise its ability to take (a case) and to resolve the appeal for review, filed against the July 22nd decision of the seventh district judge in Chiapas in the case of amparo [protective order] 274/2011, in which it was decided that the acts of dispossession committed since February 2nd, 2011 by state and federal authorities do not affect the collective rights of the Tzeltal town of Bachajón.”
Yaqui precedent
The petition to the Supreme Court was supported by the commission and the autonomous vigilance council of the adherents to the Sixth in San Sebastián Bachajón, who directed themselves to the president of the SCJN, Juan N. Silva Meza, asking that “the case’s transcendence and social and legal relevance be taken into consideration so that it may be heard by the Court and important precedents can be developed for the benefit of the protection of indigenous territories and their culture.”
They cite as precedent the protective decision for the Yaqui tribe, of Sonora, on review of the amparo 631/2012, concerning the Independence Aqueduct Project, imposed by the state and federal governments to take the Yaqui River water away from the indigenous peoples of southern Sonora.
The lawyer Lagunes Gasca considers that “by agreeing to hear the Bachajón case the SCJN would open the possibility of developing criteria for a jurisprudence on the rights of indigenous peoples, for example consultation and free, prior and informed consent,” when faced with the adoption of measures that affect their right to land and territory, cultural identity, autonomy and free determination. This would be for the “better legal protection of the country’s indigenous communities who are or can be affected by government or private projects within their territories.”
——————————————————–
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Sunday, August 25, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/08/25/politica/010n1pol
English translation by the Chiapas Support Committee for the International Zapatista Translation Service
**********************************************************************
Judge Grants Protective Order (amparo) to Tzeltal Prisoner for lack of Evidence
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, August 15, 2013
A new legal decision has been made in favour of the Tzeltal prisoner Miguel Demeza Jiménez, an adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle (Sexta Declaración de la Selva Lacandona), from the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido (Chilón). According to his defence lawyer, “it establishes that he has been wrongfully imprisoned for nearly three years”, at the mercy of evidence “obtained illicitly by the Fecdo (Special Prosecutor against Organized Crime) and endorsed by the local administration of justice, which puts in serious doubt the impartiality and independence which we have to rely on to limit the abuse of the power of the State’s General Prosecutor of Justice”.
On August 13th, they published the judgement given by David Gustavo León Hernández, first district judge in the fourth region, with residence in Xalapa, Veracruz, “through which the amparo (protective order) and the protection of federal justice is granted to Demeza Jiménez in respect of the detention order issued against him by the third criminal judge of El Amate, in Cintalapa de Figueroa, on September 30th, 2012, for the crime of robbery with violence of which he was unlawfully accused by Fecdo, an agency within the state prosecutor’s office”.
Ricardo Lagunes Gasca, the indigenous man’s lawyer, points out that the judge in Xalapa (where the Chiapas tribunals inexplicably sent his case file) “determined that the detention order violates Article 16 of the Constitution, as the El Amate judge did not duly point out the foundation and the legal and logical reasons proving the probable criminal responsibility of Demeza Jiménez”.
The case arose in relation to two acts at an Ocosingo hardware store both involving Emilio Adiel Argueta Ruiz as the complainant, which took place at that location in September and October 2010. One was a robbery at the complainant’s establishment, and the other the kidnapping of a minor, in which Argueta Ruiz’ cell phone was implicated, together with that of his friend Rubén Aníbal Ramírez Monge, but the pair instead blamed an indigenous man they did not know. In this way, the two probable culprits ended up being the accusers, against a worker, in resistance for sure against the dispossession of lands in his own ejido, but who has no relation to the crimes for which he is a prisoner.
According to his lawyer, the federal judge has now established “the guidelines which the local judge will have to observe for the issuing of a new writ of constitutional term” It is important to emphasize, Lagunes Gasca says, “that the amparo decision in favour of Demeza Jiménez is an example of the different violations of human rights of access to justice, judicial guarantees and judicial protection, denied by the Chiapas authorities”. The case exemplifies “discrimination on account of his economic situation and his belonging to an indigenous people”, he adds. “The evidence against him is illegal and inadequate”.
————————————————————–
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Friday, August 16, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/08/16/politica/017n2pol
*****************************************************************
Denouncement from Miguel Demeza Jiménez, unjustly imprisoned in the prison of el Amate in Chiapas
August 15th, 2013
Cintalapa de Figueroa, Chiapas
CERESO No. 14 “EL AMATE”
To the People of Mexico and the World
To the Compañeros adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
To the Mass and Alternative Media
To National and International Human Rights Defenders
To the Good Government Juntas and Indigenous peoples in resistance
To Public Opinion
Innocent prisoner, adherent to the Sixth, from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, Chilón municipality, Chiapas.
Communiqué: to the people of Mexico and the World about the injustice that exists in the state of Chiapas from the bad government and their allies. They made accusations against me on October 7th, 2010, they arrested me in Ocosingo, Chiapas, without an arrest warrant or detention order while I was eating at a street stall selling hot dogs.
At that time they deprived me of my freedom and I was tortured by the specialist unit and was detained in solitary confinement without charge (arraigado) for 38 days while they fabricated another crime against me, as “Fray Bartolomé de las Casas” have documented: The robbery at the Coxito hardware store in Ocosingo, Chiapas, which occurred on September 18, 2010. I was accused of being responsible, a crime which I did not commit, I should not be in jail unjustly for this: the corrupt government create and fabricate crimes and are complicit with the real criminals of Chiapas, where they commit major violations “of Human Rights “.
Governor of the state of Chiapas:
Manuel Velasco Coello
I demand my immediate freedom, prisoner adherent to the Sixth Declaration from the Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón Chilón municipality Chiapas.
I also demand the freedom of my compañeros in the struggle who are held in various prisons unjustly: Antonio Estrada Estrada (prisoner in Cereso No. 17 Playas de Catazajá, Chiapas). Alberto Patishtán Gómez, Alejandro Diaz Gomez, Political Prisoners from “La Voz del Amate”. They are held in Cereso No. 5 San Cristobal de las Casas Chiapas.
Compañeros in the struggle against the injustices of the bad government in the state and the country, receive a warm greeting and strong embraces from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón to the Pueblo Creyente and working Group and NGOs who are always aware of any movement for justice.
ATTENTIVELY
Prisoner Miguel Demeza Jiménez
*******************************************************************
Amparo (Protective Order) is denied to Ejidatarios Reclaiming their Lands in Bachajón
** It is the second judgement against the community, they emphasise
** The judge based his decision on an alleged assembly of residents
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
La Jornada, 2nd August 2013
A federal judge in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, has denied amparo (legal protection) to the Tzeltal ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, who are demanding the restitution of lands occupied by the government two years ago, against the will of the property owners and residents of the ejido.
This Thursday, Mariano Moreno Guzmán, an adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle and a representative of the community, filed an appeal for review against the decision of July 22nd by José del Carmen Constantino Avendaño, seventh district judge, who decided to dismiss the amparo 274/2011, on the grounds that the acts of dispossession implemented by various state and federal authorities on February 2, 2011 “were agreed to by the general assembly of ejidatarios, and therefore do not legally affect the complaining ejido”.
According to the ejidatarios’ lawyer, Ricardo Lagunes Gasca, the appeal for review will have to be sent in the coming weeks to the Third Collegiate Tribunal in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, for their study and resolution.
This is the second decision issued by the aforementioned judge to the detriment of the Tzeltal people of San Sebastián, “rendered on almost the same grounds as the former [decision], last January 30, which was later revoked by the Third Collegiate Tribunal of the twentieth circuit”.
Judge José del Carmen Constantino Avendaño “mainly supports the dismissal of the case for amparo by using documents contributed by the General secretary of Government”, when the post-holder was still Noé Castañón León, who held the position from the previous government until the first months of the current administration of Manuel Velasco Coello.
This documentation consisted “of an alleged act of assembly of the ejidatarios, dated February 12, 2011, objected to in time and form by Moreno Guzmán, because it does not satisfy the international standard in matters of the rights of indigenous peoples with respect to consultation and the granting of free, prior and informed consent, developed by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights”. Nor does it satisfy the legal due process standard established by the agrarian law.
Faced with the “ineffectiveness” of the order for amparo in protecting the territory of Bachajón, on May 26 the case was presented to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) and precautionary measures were requested: “to guarantee the territorial integrity of the indigenous people”. On June 19, the IACHR notified the ejido owners that it had requested information from the Mexican government, giving it a deadline of 20 days to respond.
Despite the ineffectiveness of the order for amparo, “faced with the judge’s notorious lack of impartiality and independence”, the ejidatarios warn that they will employ “all the legal remedies available to protect their territory”.
The lawyer for the indigenous emphasizes the contradiction between what has constantly been stated by the president of the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation, Juan N. Silva Meza, about the importance of human rights since the constitutional reform, and the commitments made with international organizations, “and the practices of federal judges in the most distant and poorest corners, which accommodate the interests of the political and economic power groups, thereby ignoring the right of the peoples to protect their territory”.
———————————————————————-
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Friday, August 2, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/08/02/politica/016n1pol
*********************************************************************
Judge decides against indigenous in Chiapas over case of dispossession
They accuse him of validating an illegal act
Hermann Bellinghausen
La Jornada, Tuesday July 30, 2013, p. 18
The ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón (municipality of Chilón, Chiapas), adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, have denounced that on July 22nd the judge José del Carmen Constantine Avendaño, presiding over the seventh district court in Tuxtla Gutierrez, “for the second time ruled against our right in the lawsuit concerning amparo 274/2011, saying that the dispossession of our land by the bad government does not affect the rights of the ejido, and that the document, signed only by the officialist [government-supporting] representative Francisco Guzmán Jiménez and his vigilance committee, and incorporated into the amparo which the Secretary of Government of Chiapas presented, does not bears the signatures of the ejidatarios, nor was there prior notice”. This action was “fabricated illegally to cover his crimes”, but the judge, by taking it as valid, confirms that “he approved the dispossession”.
The Tzeltal ejidatarios also demand the immediate release of two of their compañeros, imprisoned on false charges, in apparent retaliation for the resistance of their communities, through acts of police and prosecutorial corruption in Palenque and Ocosingo.
Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Demeza Jiménez remain imprisoned, the first in Playas de Catazajá and the second in El Amate. Estrada Estrada was arrested on August 7th, 2011, but his captors did not present him before the Public Ministry (MP) until the next day because they were “torturing him and fabricating his crimes”. They identify the “criminals and torturers who will surely continue to affect society through their bad behaviour” : Omar Rodríguez Aguilar, José Alfredo Pérez Flores and José Fernando Furukawa Montes (from the Federal Police), as well as the state police agents Bulmaro Morales Cruz, Isaac Arias de los Santos, Joaquín Toala Ramos and Jesús López González.
These people “fabricated the crimes against our compañero, in complicity with the MP of Palenque, Mariano Moreno Jiménez. They accused him of “attempting to assault them”, in the early morning of August 8th, on the road from Playas de Catazajá to Rancho Nuevo. The police also “planted” a discharged .38 pistol and two machetes with which he allegedly assaulted the group of policemen. “They tortured him for a whole day to make him state that he was guilty”.
Despite the torture, the expert legal doctor from the same MP, José Zetina Sánchez (“with various previous acts of corruption”), judged “that Antonio had no injuries”. But another expert legal doctor from Palenque, who examined him two days later, Jorge Trujillo Molina, stated the opposite in his opinion. “The deceit and lies of the bad government to keep our compañero locked away are clear”.
Miguel Demeza Jiménez “was also falsely accused by the Special Prosecutor Against Organized Crime (FECDO) in complicity with the hardware merchant Emilio Adiel Argueta Ruiz from the Coxito company from Ocosingo, Chiapas, and his friend the Salvadoran Ruben Anibal Ramirez Monge, who bought the Prosecutor from FECDO, on October 15th, 2010, to set them free for the crime of kidnapping a minor which took place on October 7, 2010, and they blamed our compañero Miguel in order to wash their hands of it and so that a poor indigenous would pay for a crime he did not commit.”
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/07/30/index.php?section=politica&article=018n2pol
**********************************************************************
COMMUNIQUÉ FROM THE EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 29th JULY 2013
To the people of Mexico and the world
To the compañer@s adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To national and international human rights defenders
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista Army of National Liberation
To the Network against Repression and for Solidarity
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York
To the indigenous peoples in resistance
To public opinion
We send our combative greetings to all the peoples and communities who struggle and resist with dignity in Mexico and the world against the capitalist exploitation of indigenous territories to impose their projects for mines, wind energy, tourism and hydroelectricity etc., which seek to make the indigenous disappear because they are an obstacle in the way of the lords of money and power continuing to get richer all the time.
In spite of much repression, our people continue to resist with the intention of achieving victory, as we were taught by our compañero, Juan Vazquez Guzman, who was murdered in a cowardly way by the bad government in the evening of April 24, 2013, by some hitmen who remain free and unpunished, surely enjoying the money that the government paid them to do their job.
Our compañeros Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Demeza Jimenez are still unjustly imprisoned, the first in Playas de Catazajá and the second in el Amate. Our compañero Antonio Estrada Estrada was arrested on August 7th, 2011, but the police who arrested him did not present him to the prosecutor until August 8th, 2011 because meanwhile they were torturing him and fabricating his crimes; the names of these police criminals and torturers, who will surely continue to affect society with their bad behaviour are: Omar Rodríguez Aguilar, Federal Police, José Alfredo Pérez Flores, Federal Police, José Fernando Furukawa Montes, First Sergeant of the Federal Police, Bulmaro Morales Cruz, State Preventive Police, Isaac Arias de los Santos, State Preventive Police, Joaquín Toala Ramos, Special Police and Jesús López González, Special Police.
According to the statements of these criminals, who fabricated the crimes of our compañero Antonio in collusion with the Public Minister [prosecutor] of Palenque, Chiapas, Lic. Mariano Moreno Jiménez, they accuse him of trying to attack them on August 8th in the early morning, at the height of kilometre 100 + 300 on the federal road from Playas de Catazaja to Rancho Nuevo. These policemen who fabricated the crime of our compañero also planted an discharged .38 handgun, and two machetes, with which he had allegedly attacked the group of policemen who were travelling in their units; he was tortured for a whole day to make him plead guilty to all that he was falsely accused of.
Despite the torture which was inflicted on our compañero, the expert legal doctor for the public ministry of Palenque, by name Dr Jose Zetina Sánchez, a person with a history of various incidents of corruption in the region, said in his medical report of August 8th, 2011, that Antonio had no injuries. But another expert legal doctor from Palenque, named Dr Jorge Trujillo Molina, who also examined him, says in his opinion of August 10, 2011, that he did indeed have wounds and injuries to his body.
The deceit and lies of the bad government to keep our compañero locked away are clear. Compañero Antonio Estrada Estrada is a political prisoner of this bad government, he is wrongfully imprisoned and we will continue to fight for his freedom whatever the cost. Also for our compañero Miguel Demeza Jimenez, who was falsely accused by the Special Prosecutor Against Organized Crime (FECDO) in complicity with the hardware merchant Emilio Adiel Argueta Ruiz from the Coxito company from Ocosingo, Chiapas and his friend the Salvadoran Ruben Anibal Ramirez Monge, who bought the Prosecutor from FECDO, on October 15th, 2010, so as to go free for the crime of kidnapping a minor which took place on October 7, 2010, and for this reason they blamed our compañero Miguel to wash their hands of it and so that a poor indigenous would pay for a crime he did not commit. The authority does not care about who is in jail; while a poor person has no money to buy justice, he can continue paying for the crimes of others.
On July 22, 2013, the corrupt Judge Lic. José del Carmen Constantino Avendaño, presiding over the Seventh District Court in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas, for the second time ruled against our right in the amparo 274/2011, saying that the seizure of our territory by the bad government does not affect the rights of the ejido, and that the document signed [only] by Francisco Guzmán Jiménez (aka the goyito) and his vigilance committee, handed over with the amparo by the Secretary General of the Government of Chiapas, but without the signature of the ejidatarios, and without prior notice, which is nothing other than an illegal fabrication made to cover their crimes, the judge says is a true act of assembly of the ejido and that it is proof that the highest body [of the ejido] approved the acts of dispossession.
This judge is truly a crook, he surely wants to get a high position in politics, and so goes along with the bad government instead of defending the rights of the people, he sells his dignity and honor, how much will the bad government have to pay Judge Constantino Avendaño to make these corruptions, all the judges and politicians are the same crap, they screw the people to make their bosses, the businessmen, even richer.
Although the government does not like it, we are going to continue to defend our territory because this is where we come from and we are not leaving, despite their repression and their corrupt judges we will defend it as our grandfathers and grandmothers did, until we attain victory.
JUSTICE for our people and FREEDOM for the political prisoners ANTONIO ESTRADA ESTRADA, MIGUEL DEMEZA JIMENEZ and ALBERTO PATISHTAN GOMEZ and all the political prisoners in Mexico and the world.
All our support and solidarity to our Chol compañeros and compañeras from the ejido Tila who are fighting and defending Mother Earth and are celebrating the 97th anniversary of the legalization of their ejido.
Also combative greetings and solidarity to the compañeros and compañeras of the Yaqui Tribe, who are defending their water from the projects of the bad government.
From the northern zone of Chiapas, receive an embrace from the women and men of San Sebastian Bachajón.
Attentively
Land and Freedom!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for Political Prisoners!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón Struggle continues!
*************************************************************************
San Sebastián Bachajón: Following the Assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, the Struggle for the Defence of the Land Continues
The following article was first published in Upside Down World: http://upsidedownworld.org/main/news-briefs-archives-68/4391-san-sebastian-bachajon-following-the-assassination-of-juan-vazquez-guzman-the-struggle-for-the-defense-of-the-land-continues
“The government does not like the people to organise and defend what is theirs; they repress us with state forces and order assassination to silence our movement”, declared the ejidatarios (communal landholders) of San Sebastián Bachajón recently. Despite the assassination of their much-loved community leader Juan Vázquez Guzmán, they insist: “we are here, we are staying here and we are not going to leave our land which is the birthplace of our mothers and fathers, our grandfathers and grandmothers, who also fought and gave their lives for the mother earth.”
Their struggle against luxury tourism in their territory
The indigenous Tzeltal ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón is situated in the jungle region of the state of Chiapas in South-East Mexico. It is located in an area of great natural beauty, rich in flora and fauna. The common lands of the ejido straddle the access road to the spectacular series of turquoise waterfalls of Agua Azul, and are not far from the great Maya archaeological site of Palenque. For over 20 years, the Mexican government has planned, as part of the “Maya World” concept, a high class tourist mega-project in Chiapas to rival Cancun; Agua Azul is to be the “jewel in the crown” of this development, with a luxury “eco-lodge retreat” complete with arrival at the waterfalls by helicopter or seaplane. Unfortunately for the people who have lived on and cared for this land for centuries, for whom territory is the basis of a dignified life, they are now the only obstacle to what could become, for rich tourists, “one of the most special experiences in the Western hemisphere”, and, for the resort owners, a lucrative source of income. The realization of this project would inevitably involve dispossessing or co-opting the indigenous population, and taking over their ancestral lands and territory.
As a result, the ejidatarios of Bachajón have become the recipients of daily threats, aggressions, arbitrary detentions, forced disappearances, imprisonment, extensive use of torture, and attacks from paramilitary groups. The strategy of the three levels of government has been to develop alliances with, and give support to, local political party members so they will back the government plans, and to criminalise those who resist these plans, with the aim of generating conflict among the communities in the area.
Since 2006, Juan Vázquez Guzmán had been at the center of the struggle in defense of the common lands of the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón. On 24 April, 2013, he was shot dead with six bullets in the doorway of his home. He was aged only 32, and the father of two small children aged four and seven. His community members were left devastated, and his assassins escaped into the impunity which reigns in Mexico. There has been no evidence of an investigation into the murder, and the material and intellectual authors of the crime have not been identified.
Focus of conflict: the ticket booth
In 2007, the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón “organised to defend our mother earth and natural resources”, and decided to become ‘Adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle’, a Zapatista initiative which seeks to bring together the struggles of all those ‘from below and to the left’. As part of their struggle, they decided to take back control of the booth where tourists buy tickets to view the waterfalls.
In a communiqué released on July 2, 2013, they describe what this booth represented to them: “Our toll booth is a symbol of our struggle and resistance…. It represents the exercise of our right to autonomy and self-determination, not for personal gain but for the collective benefit of our people; using the income from the booth, work and projects are carried out for the common good and the defence of our territory; it is a space of struggle.”
Government-backed forces have violently evicted the Bachajón ejidatarios from the booth on repeated occasions. One of the most serious attacks was on February 2, 2011, when federal and state authorities took possession of an area of the common lands, as well as the ticket booth, through the use of state forces together with armed civilians. This provoked a clash which resulted in the arbitrary detention of 117 people, “as a means of dissolving the indigenous organization in resistance and of pressurizing them into handing over their lands into the control of the Mexican state”, according to San Sebastián Bachajón’s legal representative, Ricardo A. Lagunes Gasca.
Following the events of February 2, 2011, the ejidatarios of Bachajón put out an urgent call for solidarity, which was answered by Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York, who coordinated an international campaign which continued until the last four of the prisoners were set free on July 23, 2011. “Here in Chiapas law and justice do not exist, but rather the government imposes its mandate,” Juan Vázquez Guzmán explains in one of the videos released during the campaign. “We will never negotiate our lands. The only thing we are asking is that they respect our right to self-determination as indigenous people. We are demanding justice, control of our land and territory, and, above all, the right to care for ourselves and conserve the natural resources of the land.”
The Amparo
On March 2, 2011, one of the founders of the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón filed a petition requesting amparo (an order for legal protection) against the arbitrary deprivation of their common lands, and protection of their territory and collective rights. The acts of February 2, 2011, the petition stated, constituted “a partial and definitive deprivation of the common use lands, without consultation, and without the full, prior and informed consent of the General Assembly.”
On January 30, 2013, the Seventh District Judge of Tuxtla Gutiérrez gave judgement on the amparo after almost two years, declaring the request inadmissible. A different court, on May 16, 2013, overturned this decision, and ordered the amparo to be reinstated, referring the claim to the General Assembly of the Ejidatarios. The matter remains unresolved; as the community’s lawyer has pointed out, this is just the beginning: the theft of the rest of their land is still to come.
At the end of May 2013, the ejidatarios sent a delegation to Mexico City to present a letter to the president of the Council of the Federal Judiciary, asking him to ensure impartiality and objectivity in the resolution of their amparo. They also visited the offices of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, to demand the return of their territory, and asked the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in Washington to issue measures to protect the autonomous authorities of the ejido and the family of Juan Vázquez Guzmán.
The struggle continues
At the end of May, 2013, a worldwide alliance of grassroots community organizations announced a new initiative in support of the adherents to the Sixth from San Sebastián Bachajón. The Week of Worldwide Action: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!” took place from Tuesday, June 25 (Juan’s birthday) to Tuesday, July 2, 2013.
Groups and individuals from all five continents took part, and acts of solidarity took place in countries including Mexico, the US, the UK, Germany, India, Austria, Peru, the Philippines, Argentina, Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa, France, Italy, Uruguay, Brazil and Colombia. Messages of support were received from many parts of the world, from organizations such as the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity and the Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Centre, and from well-known writers and thinkers Hugo Blanco, Sylvia Marcos, Gustavo Esteva, and Raúl Zibechi.
In his pronouncement, Gustavo Esteva concluded: “The struggle of Juan and the people of San Sebastian Bachajón is clearly in the forefront of the battle in which our destiny will be defined….. Juan’s struggle is directly linked with that of all of those who are defending their lands and their waters, their territories and their common properties, and also with all of those who have taken to the streets in other struggles against corruption and for justice.”
“Juan’s total commitment”, wrote Sylvia Marcos, “to the struggle for a dignified and autonomous life for his people and for the safeguarding, protection and defence of their territory was the reason for his vicious murder”.
On July 2, 2013, hundreds of men and women from San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, carried out one of their traditional acts of protest, an “informative roadblock” of the Ocosingo-Palenque highway, near the entrance to the Agua Azul waterfall. They released a communiqué the same day which they read aloud during the roadblock: “The men, women and children of San Sebastian Bachajón are willing to give their lives for our mother earth and for our struggle, just as compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán did, and as the native peoples of Mexico and the world have done for hundreds of years against oil, mining, wind, gas, dams and tourism projects, all of them bringing dispossession and death to our people, intending to destroy our way of life, our language and our culture.”
As they said in an earlier communiqué, on May 6, 2013: “The bad government wants to fill our lands with death and fear, so we get tired and no longer continue to defend our life, the people, our mother earth….but we are here and we are not going to leave, because even though they kill us and want to destroy us as indigenous peoples, the heart of the people is alive and will continue struggling whatever the cost.”
****************************************************************************
News from Sipaz
Close of global campaign “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the struggle of Bachajón continues!”
On 2 July, hundreds of men and women from San Sebastián Bachajón who adhere to the EZLN’s Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle carried out an “informative blockade” of the Ocosingo-Palenque highway, close to the entrance to the Agua Azul waterfall. The banners they raised this day spoke to the reasons for their protest: “The bad government is responsible for the death of our comrade Juan Vázquez Guzmán”; “No to the looting of our lands”; “Immediate liberation for our prisoners Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Demeza Jiménez. Immediate liberation for Alberto Patishtán and the other political prisoners of Chiapas.” The protest was held to mark the end of the global campaign “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the struggle of Bachajón continues!”
In the communique which accompanied their action, read aloud several times during the blockade, the ejidatarios announce that “The men, women, and children of San Sebastián Bachajón are prepared to give our lives for our mother earth and our struggle, as did our comrade Juan Vázquez Guzmán, and as the indigenous peoples of Mexico and throughout the world have done for centuries, to oppose projects for oil extraction, mining, wind-energy, gas extraction, dam building, tourism, and all others which promote looting and death for our peoples, so as to put an end to our way of life, with our language and culture. They want to definitively terminate our culture.”
That same day, the Fray Bartolome de Las Casas Centre for Human Rights (CDHFBC) released a pronouncement in which it stressed that “Juan Vázquez together with thousands of ejidatarios who adhere to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle have distinguished themselves through their struggle for the defence of territory, despite the reprisals of the Mexican government by means of the legal repression of their process toward autonomy. It is important to stress that with the murder of Juan Vázquez, a branch of the large tree of the conscious and dignified struggle of the Ch’ol and Tseltal peoples of the region had been cut. However, this branch has left its remnants and pathway which has eased the process and sprouts elsewhere in other struggles and comrades who join the defence of their people in the construction of autonomy and self-determination for life: a life that flows through the rivers, the wind of the jungle, smell of dignity that is inspired in each breath taken by humanity.”
Ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón recall Juan Vázquez, murdered in April
With a cultural and political event at their headquarters (Cumbre Nachoj) on 24 June, the ejidatarios who adhere to the EZLN’s Sixth Declaration of the Lacandona Jungle in San Sebastián Bachajón recalled their comrade Juan Vázquez Guzmán, who was murdered this April. In a communique released with the end of commemoration in mind, as well as to launch the Week of Global Action “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the struggle of Bachajón continues,” they denounced the Secretary of Governance, Noé Castañón, as the intellectual author of the murder of Vázquez Guzmán, emphasizing that they would continue to defend their territory. They also denounced that the new ejidal commissar had been imposed by previous ejidal authorities and the state government. The adherents to the Sixth Declaration also demanded the “immediate liberation of our comrade political prisoners Antonio Estrada Estrada, Miguel Vázquez Deara, and Miguel Demeza Jiménez, who have been unjustly incarcerated,” finding the government guilty of having fabricated crimes in these cases.
Release of Miguel Vázquez Deara, adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandona Jungle from the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón
On 26 June, Miguel Vázquez Deara, adherent to the a la Sixth Declaration of the Lacandona Jungle from the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón, was released, having been arrested in September 2011 for the presumed crimes of armed robbery and criminal association. He had been condemned to seven years and nine months imprisonment in November 2012.
In its informational bulletin published before this release, the Fray Bartolome de Las Casas Centre for Human Rights (CDHFBC) denounced that his arrest had been “based in a fabricated charge made by officialists who are interested in the Agua Azul waterfalls; he was obliged under torture to sign a declaration of self-incrimination. These acts which seek to undermine the actions taken to defend the territory of the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón by this adherent to the EZLN’s Sixth Declaration […] has a long-standing basis, going back several years.”
The CDHFBC noted that his case was symbolic, “one of the cases that reflect that in the state of Chiapas, the administration of justice is denied […] and there is a lack of adequate defence made for indigenous people; the application of the law does not accord with established legal principles, such as the presumption of innocence and, in this case particularly, the criminalization of those who organize in defence of their rights such as the right to land, self-determination, and autonomy.”
************************************************************************
Juan Silva Meza is asked for Due Judicial Attention to the imprisoned Tzeltal
** Renewed effort to free the indigenous
By: Hermann Bellinghausen,
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, July 9, 2013
The legal battle continues for the liberation of the indigenous adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle who are still in prison. On Monday, July 8, the autonomous authorities of the Sixth in the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón and the defense lawyer for Miguel Demeza Jiménez, a resident of the ejido who is imprisoned, requested in writing that the president of the Council of the Federal Judiciary, Minister Juan N. Silva Meza, guarantee due attention to his legal situation, because the Tzeltal worker is suffering imprisonment for no reason.
On June 20th, Ricardo Alfonso Morcillo Moguel, judge of the fifth district in Chiapas, in an act that revealed his fear of hearing the case, sent Demeza Jiménez’ request for amparo (legal protection) (1478/2012), to the first district judge of the auxiliary center for the fourth region in Xalapa, Veracruz. The case was filed in that court, in the charge of Judge David Gustavo León Hernández, on June 28 (directory 329/2013).
Faced with this manoeuvre, the ejido owners ask Silva Meza to guarantee that the judge of the fourth region in Xalapa “undertakes a scrupulous study of the case and applies the highest standards of protection and interpretation of human rights for the resolution of the case for amparo.”
Demeza Jiménez, a 32-year old campesino and mason, an adherent to the Sexta, “has been unjustly deprived of his freedom since October 7, 2010,” the San Sebastián ejido owners maintain. Immediately, the Office of the Special Prosecutor against Organized Crime requested his arraigo (detention without charge) at the Quinta Pitiquitos (a house for “arraigo” of the previous government, on the outskirts of Tuxtla Gutiérrez), “and he was tortured.”
The prosecution, the lawyer Ricardo Lagunes Gasca emphasizes, “unlawfully constructed the accusation against him for robbery with violence and kidnapping. Miguel is under criminal process for both crimes. He has still not been sentenced, therefore he continues fighting legally and politically for his release from the State Center for the Social Re-insertion of the Sentenced (CERSS) 14 El Amate.”
Another ejido member, Antonio Estrada, has been a prisoner since August 2011 in the CERSS 17 in Playas de Catazajá, for “robbery with violence and carrying a firearm for the exclusive use of the Army, using items unlawfully obtained; he was tortured into signing a confession,” adds the legal representative of the indigenous.
“His arrest was headed by Juan Álvaro Moreno, leader of the Green Party in Xanil, Chilón municipality, who pointed him out as a member of the adherents to the Sexta in the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido who have resisted the governmental dispossession,” he adds.
Álvaro Moreno “participated in the violent eviction on February 2, 2011 and was part of the group that, together with Carmen Aguilar Gómez Primero and Miguel Ruiz Hernández, held conversations with the then Secretary of Government Noé Castañón León at the end of 2010, to organize the eviction and dispossession of the San Sebastián lands.”
———————————————————–
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Wednesday, July 10, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/07/10/politica/017n1pol
English translation by the Chiapas Support Committee for the: International Zapatista Translation Service, a collaboration of the: Chiapas Support Committee, California, Wellington Zapatista Support Group, UK Zapatista Solidarity Network
****************************************************************
From Brooklyn, New York: Solidarity with San Sebastián Bachajón
On Wednesday, June 19th a group of organizers and activists, and non-conforming children, from across New York City came together to educate ourselves about the work of the Zapatistas, Movement for Justice in El Barrio, and the struggle of San Sebastián Bachajón.
We shared a meal, introduced ourselves to each other and shared one way that Zapatismo has impacted our lives and work.
There was such a wide range of experiences in the room, from newly radicalized activists from Occupy and others who knew very little about the Zapatistas and other Sixth Declaration adherents, to long-time Zapatista solidarity activists, including one who had just completed his PhD on the intellectual origins of the Zapatista uprising! Because there was such a range of knowledge and experience we spent some time familiarizing ourselves on the history of the Zapatistas before watching the new video regarding Movement for Justice in El Barrio.
The Movimiento video was moving for many of us in the room and we spent time discussing it in small groups and as a large group. As a group we raised our consciousness about the Zapatistas, Movement for Justice in El Barrio, and struggles of the Sixth Declaration. We committed to each independently spend time with the information on the Viva Bachajón blog to learn more about the struggle of San Sebastián Bachajón and the recent murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán. Below is a letter in support of this struggle:
We have come together as community and labor organizers, parents, students, artists and teachers in Brooklyn, New York to educate ourselves on the struggles of our brothers and sisters adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle.
We write today to denounce the murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, Secretary General of the adherents to the Sixth Declaration from the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón, and a passionate organizer in defense of the land and territory of his community. Two months since Juan’s tragic death, and on the eve of his birthday, we call for justice and an end to impunity.
In the face of imposed development plans to turn their territory into a private luxury destination, the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón have asserted their right to protect and care for the beautiful waterfalls of Agua Azul. For this they have been threatened, detained, disappeared, imprisoned, tortured and attacked by state forces and paramilitary groups.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán was a leader of his people in the struggle to defend their land, their history, customs and traditions, their livelihood and means of sustenance. For this we have learned his name, and of the struggle of his community. We recognize the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón as one more group defending the wellbeing of our Earth and society against a form of development that places profit above all else. For this we honor them and raise our voices to demand…
Land, Freedom and Justice for the Ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón!
******************************************************************
From the UK: protest against the murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán
Representatives from groups from around the UK delivered a letter to the Mexican Embassy in London protesting against the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and the continued harassment of indigenous peoples in San Sebastián Bachajón in Chiapas, South East Mexico.
This was part of the “Week of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, The Bachajón struggle continues!” in support of Bachajón that has seen protests in cities around the world.
An altar was constructed outside the embassy, music was played and the groups gave out information to passers-by about the Bachajón struggle. They also spoke to embassy staff who confirmed they would relate their feelings back to the Mexican government and to the relevant authorities in Chiapas.
The community of San Sebastián Bachajón has been in the forefront of the struggle for land in Chiapas during the last few years. There are plans to turn their village into a lucrative tourist destination for the nearby waterfalls at Agua Azul. As such the community has suffered years of violence, threats, abuse, arrests on false charges and invasion and occupation of the village by state forces. As a community leader Juan was an important figure in the village’s resistance and was, and indeed still is, an inspiration to the local people as they seek to defend their land and the rights of all indigenous peoples in Mexico and beyond.
Groups from the UK, Europe and beyond are calling for the return of common lands to the people of San Sebastián Bachajón and the respect for their rights as indigenous peoples. They are also calling for a full investigation into Juan’s murder and that those responsible for the killing be brought to justice.
The letter delivered to the Mexican Embassy reads as follows:
To:
Lic. Enrique Peña Nieto, Presidente de la República
Lic. Manuel Velasco Coello, Gobernador Constitucional del Estado de Chiapas
Lic. Leonardo Rafael Guirao Aguilar, Presidente Municipal de Chilón, Chiapas
Sr Alejandro Ives Estivill Castro
Mexican Ambassador to the UK
Embassy of Mexico
16 St George Street
London
W1S 1FD.
Sirs
Re: The repression of the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, the dispossession of their common lands, and the assassination of the community leader and human rights defender Juan Vázquez Guzmán.
The recent brutal assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, former Secretary General of the Adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, has highlighted the repression being experienced by this community as a result of a violent campaign to displace them from their ancestral lands and territory in order to construct a luxury upmarket tourist development.
We wish to express our indignation and sadness about the murder, our alarm at the increase in violence towards those who seek to defend their rights, common lands, natural resources and our Mother Earth, and to call for justice and an end to the threats against the family of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón.
The community’s request for amparo (legal protection) against the arbitrary deprivation of their common lands, and for the protection of their territory and collective rights, has so far been treated with a disturbing lack of impartiality and independence, and has demonstrated a lack of respect for indigenous peoples, contrary to their rights established under ILO Convention 169 concerning Indigenous and Tribal Peoples, and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, both of which have been signed by the Mexican government.
We demand:
- A full and fair investigation into the material and intellectual authors of the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, and punishment of those responsible
- Respect for the fundamental human rights of the indigenous Tseltal peoples of San Sebastián Bachajón, and guarantees for their security and integrity
- Respect and guarantees for their right to the full use and enjoyment of their territory
- Respect for their right to self-determination and the construction of their autonomy
- An end to the plunder and dispossession, the theft of commons, the militarisation of the area, and to the threats and violence being experienced
- Freedom for the prisoners of Bachajón
- A fair, impartial and objective resolution of amparo 274/2011
We understand that the repression being experienced by the ejidatarios, adherents to the Sixth from San Sebastián Bachajón is rooted in the neoliberal political and economic interests of transnational corporations and the three levels of Mexican government. We will continue to monitor closely any developments in the area, and to offer the community and family of Juan Vázquez Guzmán our total support.
Respectfully
UK Zapatista Solidarity Network
Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group
Edinburgh Chiapas Solidarity Group
KIPTIK
London Mexico Solidarity Group
Manchester Zapatista Solidarity Group
West Yorkshire Zapatista Solidarity Group
Zapatista Solidarity Group – Essex 1st July, 2013
*********************************************************************
Tzeltales Maintain a Roadblock on the Ocosingo-Palenque Highway
** They place responsibility on the government for the death of Juan Vázquez
** They demand the freedom of Antonio Estrada, Miguel Demeza and Alberto Patishtán
By: Hermann Bellinghausen, Envoy
San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, July 2, 2013
Hundreds of men and women –the women dressed in the Tzeltal custom, with flowers on their blouses and ribbons on their skirts–, under the sun and under the rain hold three big banners crosswise over the Ocosingo-Palenque Highway, a few meters from the turning to the Agua Azul Waterfalls. They also get in the way themselves, in an informative roadblock; and if they are missing, they place branches and sticks on the asphalt.
The protest, which results in long lines of stopped vehicles, has motives which are summarized in the simple and raw words of their banners: “The bad government is responsible for the death of compa Juan Vázquez Guzmán. No to the plunder of our lands! Immediate freedom for our prisoners Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Demeza Jiménez! Immediate freedom for Alberto Patishtán and the other Chiapas political prisoners!” They cry ‘long live’ to the peoples in resistance and to the Zapatista Caracoles.
“We are letting sick people and those who they need pass through,” explains one of the ejido members in charge of the mobilization–in his own ejidal territory– of the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle. Every two hours they let through cars and buses. And every so often, the indigenous read through a megaphone their pronouncement in which they demand justice for the assassination of their leader, respect for their territorial integrity, and freedom for their imprisoned compañeros.
It is certainly not the only roadblock of the day. From Tuxtla Gutiérrez to San Cristóbal de las Casas, Ocosingo and Palenque, members of the Mexican Alliance of Transport Workers Organizations (AMOTAC) keep the Chiapas highways closed, with big cargo trucks laid across them. But the only road closure of the Tzeltal ejido owners is a political meeting in situ: these same lands are the lands that they are defending.
Taking advantage of the line of vehicles that are waiting to pass, women and girls from nearby sell fruits, fritters and drinks. “Aire fresco, Aire fresco, (Fresh air, fresh air),” offers a little girl, and in the midday heat it doesn’t seem like a bad idea. But the reality is that the Tzeltales don’t pronounce the “r” clearly, and the chant means to say: “Hay refresco, hay refresco, (Soft drinks here, soft drinks here),” and a bucket in her arms confirms it.
By means of a flyer printed over the effigy of the leader assassinated in April, one side in Spanish and the other in imperfect English, the ejido owners demand the liberation of Antonio and Miguel, “kidnapped in prison,” and inform the public (there are tourists of different nationalities, and the local population) that since February 2011 the government “illegally took possession of our communal lands to impose their capitalist projects.”
This same day, the Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Human Rights Center (Frayba) joined the demand for justice for Juan Vázquez Guzmán and the Bachajón struggle, in a pronouncement which reads: “Juan, together with thousands of ejido owners and adherents to the Sixth Declaration from San Sebastian Bachajón, has been distinguished for the struggle in defense of their territory in spite of reprisals by the government through the judicial persecution of their process of autonomy”.
Frayba emphasizes that his assassination “cut a branch from the great tree of conscious and dignified struggle of the Chol and Tzeltal people of the region; nevertheless, that branch has left a footprint and a path, he paved the way and sprouts in other compañeras and compañeros who join in the defense of their people in the construction of autonomy and free will for life”.
The civil organization urged the government of Mexico “to adopt, in an immediate and urgent manner, all the measures necessary in order to guarantee the right to life, personal integrity and security of the members of the community of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration, as well as to the defenders of human rights, who exercise their labor in favor of their Territory and Life”.
————————————–
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Wednesday, July 3, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/07/03/politica/019n1pol
English translation by the Chiapas Support Committee for the:
International Zapatista Translation Service, a collaboration of the:
Chiapas Support Committee, California
Wellington Zapatista Support Group
UK Zapatista Solidarity Network
******************************************************************
** A Worldwide Week is held in memory of the assassinated Zapatista in Bachajón
** Request in New Zealand for the Government of Mexico to end abuses against indigenous Tzeltal people
** Support in Paris and Toulouse for the struggle of this community against the Agua Azul tourism project.
By Hermann Bellinghausen – Envoy
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, Mexico, 30 of June.
In solidarity with the struggle of the community of San Sebastián Bachajón, there will be a “Worldwide Week” from today until next Tuesday, in memory of the indigenous representative Juan Vázquez Guzmán who was assassinated in April, and because “the Bachajón struggle continues”.
In Wellington, the capital of New Zealand, the Wellington Zapatista Group held a vigil with candles and flowers outside the diplomatic office of Mexico and submitted to ambassador Rosaura Leonora Rueda Gutiérrez a petition to the government of Enrique Peña Nieto demanding that the killers of Guzmán be brought to justice, and an end be put to the rampant abuses of the rights of indigenous Tzeltal communities of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle.
Collectives in Paris and Toulouse, France, announced their support for the struggle of the Bachajón community against the tourism project of Agua Azul in their territory and the exploitation of their lands. They denounced the violence committed by the paramilitary groups in collusion with the authorities.
Referring to Juan, they recognised that he “gave his life for the defense of his territory” and that his death was “clearly a political assassination under the command of the bad government.” They insist that the crime “will not stop the resistance and determination against attacks by the government, the puppet of the transnationals.”
On Friday, indigenous adherents to the Sixth Declaration expressed their gratitude especially to Movement for Justice in El Barrio of New York, which promoted this week of protests. At the same time, acts of solidarity were celebrated in Colombia, England (Dorset and London), Germany (Berlin) and the United States, as well as other parts of Mexico (Puebla, Veracruz, Michoacán and the Federal District).
The activists in New Zealand say in the letter to the Mexican government, “We, have been following with concern the response of the federal, state and municipal governments to the civil resistance in defence of their land by the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón.
Since 2007, they have suffered violence and repression at the hands of Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI)-backed authorities and paramilitary organizations. Their resistance to the take-over of Tzeltal traditional lands for transnational projects, particularly the site of the Agua Azul waterfalls, has placed them squarely in the firing line of those who seek to dispossess them of their lands for commercial gain.”
The “concerted attempts to break up the community and its resistance” began in 2009, with the detention of eight ejidatarios by state and federal police, and the “vicious assault” on Ricardo Lagunes at a PRI paramilitary checkpoint after he left a meeting in Bachajón. Two years later in 2011, 117 ejidatarios were arbitrarily detained by police during an eviction attempt at the toll booth at the entrance to the Agua Azul area, and ten of them remained political prisoners for an extended period of time.”
The letter continues “Physical violence and repression have been coupled with legal and judicial abuses, including court decisions denying the rights of ejidatarios, and their arrests and eviction in 2011 enabling authorities to take control of the collectively-owned lands”.
The “ongoing assaults” on Bachajón autonomy “culminated on the night of April 24, 2013 in the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán in the doorway of his home”. The man who was Secretary General of the three centres of the ejido since April 2010, “was riddled with six bullets after answering his door, and no-one has yet been charged with his murder”.
The New Zealand supporters demanded “protection for the common use lands of the indigenous”, as well as an “exhaustive investigation” into the death of Vázquez Guzmán and the liberation of Antonio Estrada Estrada (prisoner in CERSS 17, Playas de Catazajá, Chiapas), Miguel Vázquez Deara (prisoner in CERSS 16, Ocosingo, Chiapas) and Miguel Demeza Jiménez (prisoner in CERSS 14, El Amate), also adherents to the Sixth in the ejido.
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Monday, July 1, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/07/02/politica/013n1pol
English translation by the Wellington Zapatista Support Group for the:
International Zapatista Translation Service, a collaboration of the:
Chiapas Support Committee, California
Wellington Zapatista Support Group
UK Zapatista Solidarity Network
*************************************************************************
Letter from Gustavo Esteva regarding the “Juan Vazquez Guzman Lives, The Bachajón Struggle continues!” campaign
To the Week of Worldwide Action: “Juan Vazquez Guzman Lives, The Bachajón Struggle continues!”
To the compañeros and compañeras from the San Sebastian Bachajón community, Movement for Justice in El Barrio, and all the people and organizations that are in solidarity with them.
I write this letter on the day the week for Bachajón begins, the day of Juan Vázquez Guzmán’s birthday. Although I continue to be inspired by his good humor, the joy that exuded from his commitment to life, I cannot avoid the sadness, grief, and pain caused by his murder, which today his two young sons and all his compañeros and compañeras must be feeling all over again.
We must bear with fortitude the state of affairs, the situation in which we find ourselves. Those who should ensure compliance with the law are dedicated to violating it. Those who have the legal power to use violence to protect the citizens are using it against them. The legal machinery systematically mocks justice, and dresses up despotism with the mantle of mock courts. It is absurd to keep talking about the rule of law and democracy when things are like they are now.
They say they did not blindfolded the eyes of the image of the woman used as a symbol of justice so that she could represent impartiality, as is sometimes believed, but rather so that she could not see the horrors into which one falls when a state of emergency is declared. This is where we are: in an undeclared state of emergency in which all the vices and evils of injustice are incurred, all the horrors that justice must not see. “Here in Chiapas”, Juan once said, “law and justice do not exist, rather the government imposes its mandate.”
Far from impelling us into paralysis or despair, this unbearable situation impels us to take the initiative and nourishes our hope. Being faced with the crimes and impunities of the bad government boosts the energy of those who, inspired and encouraged by Juan, decide to carry forward the struggle and join in solidarity with many other compañeros and compañeras who have everywhere decided to resist.
The struggle of Juan and the people of San Sebastian Bachajón is clearly in the forefront of the battle in which our destiny will be defined. Having reached its limit, wealth is today resorting to colonial procedures from the past: on dispossession, on open violence, as a last resort to continue its savage accumulation. What we have been calling ‘extractivism’ applies equally to the large mining projects, to the turquoise waterfalls of “Agua Azul” whose defense cost Juan his life, to the new urban landholdings or to financial plunder. This is why Juan’s struggle is directly linked with that of all of those who are defending their lands and their waters, their territories and their common properties, and also with all of those who have taken to the streets in other struggles against corruption and for justice, like those underway at the moment in Brazil.
“The bad government should know,” affirm the dignified heirs of Juan, “that the people of San Sebastian Bachajón continue resisting, and that our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán still lives among us, watching over his people from above.”
The bad government should know, we say now, that we are many who in many diverse parts of the world are raising the same banners, resisting with the same determination, and we will not stop this struggle until the rights of Bachajón are respected and justice fully done. As they themselves say, Juan’s voice has not been silenced, nor has the work of his heart come to an end.
From San Pablo Etla, a Zapotec people in Oaxaca, I fully join this worldwide call, which must reach many other hearts.
Gustavo Esteva
***********************************************************************
Today, there will be an “informative roadblock” at Agua Azul about the murder
Ejidatarios declare they are willing to give their lives for their land
They denounce the government “networks of complicity” to dispossess them
Hermann Bellinghausen
La Jornada
Tuesday July 2, 2013, p. 13
San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas. July 1.
The ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, announced that on Tuesday they will be holding a demonstration at the Agua Azul crossroads, on the international Ocosingo-Palenque highway. It will be an informative roadblock “in memory of our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán and for the release of our prisoners”.
The men, women and children of San Sebastián declare themselves “willing to give our lives for our mother earth and for our struggle, just as compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán did, and as the native peoples of Mexico and the world have done for hundreds of years against projects bringing dispossession and death to our people, intending to destroy our way of life, our language, our culture”.
They assert that Vazquez Guzman (“heart of our struggle”), assassinated two months ago, “gave his life for his people, he ignored the threats and persecutions, because he loved his people and wanted to see them free from oppression, he wanted them to be more autonomous, to come out of poverty”.
They denounced “the networks of corruption and complicities of the government which aim to displace the people of San Sebastián Bachajón from their land and to dismantle our organization in resistance and our opposition to neoliberal tourism projects which are only for the rich, and for which we will only carry the luggage and clean the toilets”.
Since 2010, the ejidatarios knew that Noé Castañón León (Secretary of Government through several presidencies) “was meeting at his offices in Tuxtla Gutierrez with former ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez (aka the goyito), Carmen Aguilar Gómez Primero, Miguel Ruiz Hernández and Juan Alvaro Moreno, to plan the dispossession of our toll booth, which is a symbol of our struggle and resistance, which brings benefit to the communities”.
The booth, they said, “represents the exercise of our right to autonomy and self-determination; using the income from the booth, work and projects are carried out for the common good and the defense of our territory, it is a space of struggle”.
117 indigenous have been imprisoned
On February 2, 2011, “the bad government commanded indigenous brothers without dignity to advance, with weapons paid for by the current Municipal President of Chilón, Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, who was at that time President of the Green Chiapas Foundation, to beat our organization and deliver the booth and ejidal lands to the state government of Chiapas and the federal government, these are still today guarded by the federal and state police and by the National Commission for Protected Natural Areas”. On February 3, 117 indigenous were imprisoned.
“Is this democracy? To deprive our people of the lands they have inhabited for centuries? To torture our compañeros Miguel Demeza Jiménez, Antonio Estrada Estrada (both prisoners) and Miguel Vazquez Deara (now free) in order to accuse them of false crimes? Is this why they are public officials, so they can screw the people and still get paid every fortnight as if they were doing a good job? Is it democracy when the federal judges sell themselves for crumbs to keep in with the government, to look after their political careers and not to protect human rights? When the government orders the murder of a social activist and human rights defender like Juan Vázquez Guzmán?”
Power, they say, “decides who the law protects, so that it never protects the poor, the weak, those who have nothing to give but their word, this is why we are thrown over by the law, justice, in short by the police, the armed forces”. As if that was not enough, “the government also intervenes in the internal elections of ejidal authorities and makes its frauds through the Agrarian Prosecutor of Ocosingo, the National Agrarian Registry, the Chilón Government delegation, the Undersecretary of Government and the Municipal Presidency of Chilón, to impose a person who has not even lived in the ejido, like Alejandro Moreno Gómez, who is only manipulated by the former ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzman Jimenez”.
They demand that the federal and state governments respect “the autonomy and self-determination of our people”. If not, they say, “we have the legitimate right to defend what is ours, because we have all the land documents”.
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/07/02/index.php?section=politica&article=013n1pol
**********************************************************************
FROM EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, ADHERENT TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO.
JULY 2, 2013
To the people of Mexico and the world
To the companer@s adherents to the sixth declaration of the lacandon jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To the defenders of national and international human rights
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Network against Repression and for Solidarity
To the movement for justice in el barrio New York and Committees of the true word
To the Indigenous National Congress
To the indigenous peoples in resistance
To public opinion
Compañeros and compañeras, rebels with dignified hearts, in solidarity with the just and legitimate struggle of San Sebastián Bachajón, we send you our simple and humble word which was born from our rebel hearts, we who struggle for justice and for respect for the original peoples of Mexico and the world, we who have endured centuries of humiliation and extermination, we the poorest and most excluded, we the persecuted, the imprisoned, the tortured, we who do not sell our dignity for crumbs from the bad government, and who care for and defend our mother earth whatever the consequences.
We greet all the compañeros and compañeras, peoples, communities and organizations in Mexico and the world who have offered prayers and homages in memory of our compa Juan Vázquez Guzmán, heart of our struggle and of our people. Compañero Juan gave his life for his people, for the love of his people he ignored the threats and persecutions made against him, because he loved his people and wanted to see them free from oppression and exploitation by the bad governments, he sought for his people to be more autonomous, to come out of the brutal poverty that capitalism imposes, backed up by the bad governments who are like the minions of the businessmen, who sell to the highest bidder forgetting that they are supposedly representatives and not owners of the country.
Compa Juan denounced the networks of corruption and complicities of the government which aim to displace the people of San Sebastián Bachajón from their land and to dismantle our organization in resistance and our opposition to neoliberal tourism projects which are only for the rich and for which we will only carry the luggage and clean the toilets.
Since late 2010 it has now been known that Noé Castañón León and his gang were meeting in their offices in Tuxtla Gutierrez with former ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez (aka the goyito) as well as with the following people: Carmen Aguilar Gómez Primero, Miguel Ruiz Hernández and Juan Alvaro Moreno, to plan the theft of our lands where our toll booth was situated, which is a symbol of our struggle and resistance, which brings benefit to the communities. That booth represents the exercise of our right to autonomy and self-determination, not for personal gain but for the collective benefit of our people; using the income from the booth, work and projects are carried out for the common good and the defense of our territory, it is a space of struggle. But the government did not like to see how our movement is growing, it does not like people to think for themselves and be independent, it wants us to be poor and to depend on its crumbs so it can control us when it is election time, so that their blondie of the soap operas will keep winning, the Green Ecological Party, the Institutional Revolutionary Party, etc. So, on February 2, 2011 the bad government commanded indigenous brothers without dignity to advance, with weapons paid for by the current Municipal President of Chilón, Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, who was at that time President of the Green Chiapas Foundation, to beat our organization and deliver the booth and ejidal lands to the state government of Chiapas and the federal government, these are still today guarded by the federal and state police and by the National Commission for Protected Natural Areas (CONANP).
On February 3, 2011, 117 compañeros were imprisoned on a whim by this wicked government to force our organization to give up our land. Is this democracy? Is it democracy to deprive our people of the lands they have inhabited for centuries? Is it democracy to torture our compañeros Miguel Demeza Jiménez, Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Vazquez Deara – who is free today – in order to accuse them of false crimes? Is that why they are public officials so they can screw the people and still get paid every fortnight as if they were doing a good job? Is it democracy when the federal judges sell themselves for crumbs to keep in with the government, to look after their political careers and not to protect human rights? Is it democracy when the government orders the murder of a social activist and human rights defender like Juan Vázquez Guzmán?
The men, women and children of San Sebastian Bachajón are willing to give their lives for our mother earth and for our struggle, just as compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán did, and as the native peoples of Mexico and the world have done for hundreds of years against oil, mining, wind, gas, dams and tourism projects, all of them bringing dispossession and death to our people, intending to destroy our way of life, our language, our culture, they want to finish off our culture once and for all. The law only serves power and money, power decides who the law protects, so that it never protects the poor, the weak, those who have nothing to give but their word, this is why we have had enough of money and power, this is why we are thrown over by the law, justice, in short by the police, the armed forces, this is why the jails are full of poor people, and when a rich person goes to jail they only stay a short time, and leave early because they reach agreement with the powerful, they split the stolen money and the matter is settled.
As if the plunder was not enough, the government also intervenes in the internal elections of ejidal authorities and makes its frauds through the Agrarian Prosecutor of Ocosingo, the National Agrarian Registry, the Chilón Government delegation, the Undersecretary of Government in Yajalón and the Municipal Presidency of Chilón, to impose a person who has not even lived in the ejido, like Alejandro Moreno Gómez, who is only manipulated by the former ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzman Jimenez to continue making manoeuvres about the booth and dispossessing the ejido.
We demand that the federal and state government respects the autonomy and self-determination of our people, if not we will respect the legitimate right to defend what is ours, because we have all the land documents and on this land our grandparents lived, and the government will not come here to say what will be done.
We demand respect for our territory and our organization. We demand the freedom of our compañeros ANTONIO ESTRADA ESTRADA, a prisoner in CERSS 17 Playas Catazajá and MIGUEL DEMEZA JIMENEZ, imprisoned in CERSS 14 Amate.
In memory of our compañero Juan Vazquez Guzman and for the release of our prisoners we will today be holding a demonstration at the Agua Azul crossroads, on the international Ocosingo-Palenque highway. From the northern region of Chiapas, receive a combative embrace from the women and men of San Sebastian Bachajón.
Respectfully
Land and Freedom! Zapata Lives!
Hasta la victoria siempre! Long live the Zapatista National Liberation Army!
Freedom for the Political Prisoners!
Juan Vazquez Guzman Lives, the Bachajón Struggle continues!
********************************************************************
From Mexico: Pronouncement from Sylvia Marcos about Juan Vázquez Guzmán and San Sebastián Bachajón
We are excited to share with you a new pronouncement which has been sent to us by our great friend and compañera of many struggles, the great Mexican feminist and thinker-activist Dr Sylvia Marcos.
All those who knew Juan Vázquez Guzmán will agree with our compañera Sylvia that Juan was a “brave, strong and gallant leader who was also a cheerful and close friend”. Who among us can forget the joyous smile and great enthusiasm that Juan always showed even in the face of the vicious attacks instigated and promulgated against him by those who have kidnapped justice and the law in order to sell them to “capitalist greed”?
The kidnapped law and justice are today used for “land grabbing, the eviction of campesinos and indigenous people from their lands, and…the destruction of villages and communities, cultures and ecosystems”.
Sylvia explains it very clearly: Juan Vázquez Guzmán “… experienced” all this “first-hand” and never stopped fighting “for the rights of his people and his community”. This is why she urges us to follow the example of Juan Vázquez Guzmán: never to give up defending “our heritage, and that of humanity…nature”.
Without more ado, we leave you with this urgent letter from compañera Dr Sylvia Marcos:
To our sisters and brothers from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón
To our Zapatista sisters and brothers
To our compañer@s of the Sixth
To the indigenous peoples in resistance
To Movement for Justice in El Barrio
Juan Vázquez Guzmán
The Bachajon struggle continues
Compañer@s,
On many occasions, government forces, subservient to multinational corporations, have violently displaced the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón from their own territory
The state and federal authorities took possession of an area of the common lands through the use of state forces.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán was a brave, strong and gallant leader who was also a cheerful and close friend. He defended community rights and never let himself be intimidated by the threats made over many years, or by the violent evictions he experienced first-hand; instead he fought for the rights of his people and his community.
Capitalism, with its aggressive and speculative financial activities, generates land grabbing, the eviction of campesinos and indigenous people from their lands, and causes the destruction of villages and communities, cultures and ecosystems.
Bachajón has been one of these, and it continues to resist the cruel ravages of this neoliberal commercialization which aims to build a Boutique Hotel at the waterfalls of Agua Azul, and appropriate all the surrounding territory for developing luxury tourism.
The Agua Azul waterfalls, with their beauty and their biodiversity, are not only the heritage of the Tzeltal peoples, which for centuries they have protected and cared for; they are also our heritage, and that of humanity. The plunder of nature is the plunder we suffer alongside the Tzeltal communities who cherish it. The inhabitants of Bachajon are defending nature, and we thank them because by doing so they are also defending us, and at the same time defending the Mother Earth, and defending the jungle and its biodiversity.
For them, the land is the source of life. For the government of Chiapas and the multinationals, the land is a source from which to extract wealth.
Juan Vázquez affirmed the beliefs of his Mayan ancestors: their reverence and respect for Mother Earth: caves, hills, natural springs and the sacred nature of sowing and planting. All of this must be defended from the capitalist greed which is destroying the planet.
His total commitment to the struggle for a dignified and autonomous life for his people and for the safeguarding, protection and defense of their territory was the reason for his vicious murder.
We are with you, compañeros of Bachajón,
Juan Vázquez Guzmán gave his life for the defense of the land.
The struggle continues, Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives.
We join with all those who strive to construct a better world, so we unite our strength and actions together.
No to impunity for the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán
Let us build alternative means of struggle in our communities
With hope on the path of resistance that the Zapatistas have taught us.
*********************************************************************
Pronouncement from Frayba regarding the Week of Worldwide Action: ¡Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, The Struggle of Bachajón Continues!
This human rights center (Frayba) is united in the demand for justice during the “Week of World Action: ¡Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, The Struggle of Bachajón Continues!”
The continuation of territorial plunder arising from transnational projects continues its progress, they strengthen their strategies of neocolonial plunder through projects that consider elements of national security, human rights and protection of investment of government-linked businesses that have direct interests in the territories of great wealth in biodiversity; the majority of these are found in the territory of the indigenous and peasant communities just as it is in the disputed territory that the communal farmers, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation, maintain.
Juan Vázquez together with thousands of communal farmers, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of San Sebastian Bachajón, has been distinguished by the struggle in defense of their territory, in spite of reprisals of the Mexican Government through the judicial persecution of their process of autonomy.
It is important to note that in light of the murder of Juan Vázquez, a branch was cut from the great tree of the conscious and worthy struggle of the Chol and Tseltal of the region. Nevertheless, that branch has left a print and path, that eased the process and sprouts in other companions who join in the defense of their community in the construction of autonomy and free will for life; life that flows in the rivers and wind in the jungle, smelling of dignity that is breathed in each breath of humanity.
Therefore, Frayba urges the government of Chiapas to open investigations for the clarification of the murder of Juan Vázquez, to punish the intellectual authors as well as the perpetrators. Additionally, we demand the freedom of Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Demeza Jiménez.
Finally, we exhort the Mexican Government to adopt, in an immediate and urgent manner, all the measures necessary in order to guarantee the right to life, personal integrity and security of the members of the community of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration, as well as to the defenders of human rights, that they exercise their labor in favor of their Territory and Life.
***********************************************************************
EUROPEAN PRONOUNCEMENT IN SUPPORT OF THE WEEK OF WORLDWIDE ACTION “JUAN VÁZQUEZ GUZMÁN LIVES! THE BACHAJÓN STRUGGLE CONTINUES!” FROM TUESDAY, JUNE 25TH TO TUESDAY, JULY 2ND, 2013
IN HONOUR OF JUAN VÁZQUEZ GUZMÁN AND IN SUPPORT OF SAN SEBASTIÁN BACHAJÓN
To our sisters and brothers of the Ejido San Sebastian Bachajón
To our Zapatista sisters and brothers
To our compañer@s of the Sexta
To the Committees of the True Word
To civil society
To public opinion
To national and international human rights defenders
To the peoples in resistance
To the mass and alternative media
To people of good conscience throughout the world
We know that in all corners of the world the forces of neoliberalism are destroying the land, the territory, the natural resources and all living things as part of the insane desire of transnational corporations, banks, and their allies in governments to develop more and bigger megaprojects. In this process, the original inhabitants of the lands become disposable. If they cannot be bought out, they are displaced, dispossessed, cast aside, and assassinated.
This is what has been happening since 2006 to the adherents to the Sixth Declaration from San Sebastián Bachajón, and is what has led to the murder of their community leader Juan Vázquez Guzmán. The forces of greed and plunder want to seize control of the potentially extremely lucrative tourist destination of the Waterfalls of Agua Azul. Hence the ongoing violence, repression, threats, arrests on false charges, abuse, plunder, arbitrary actions, and the invasion and occupation of the area by state forces. Juan was a constant inspiration, both to his compañeros in their dignified struggle in defence of their ancestral land and territory and of their rights as indigenous peoples, and also to other social movements throughout Mexico.
We the undersigned call for the return of their common lands to the people of San Sebastián Bachajón, respect for the rights of these indigenous peoples to their land and territory, respect for their right to self-determination and the search for alternative ways of life, as well as a full investigation into Juan’s assassination, and punishment of those responsible.
In our own places we are also engaged in these struggles, and we know we must all work together to save the planet from destruction by the few, in pursuit of their own personal enrichment, at the expense of the many. So we offer our full support to this campaign, and our solidarity to our compañer@s from San Sebastián Bachajón in the continuation of their most dignified struggle. We honour the example set by Juan Vázquez Guzmán of dedication, commitment, passion and resistance. He remains with us all on the path to a better world.
For more information: https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com/en-ingles/
Respectfully
Groups:
ASSI (Acción social Sindical Internacionalista) Zaragoza, Spain
Associazione commercio equo Jambo –Fidenza, Italy
Caracol Mundo-Eco de Latido en Solidaridad, Austria
Centro de Documentación sobre Zapatismo, CEDOZ, Spain
Comitato Chiapas “Maribel” – Bergamo, Italia
Committee against Austerity, UK
Committee of the True Word from Southwest England
CTN Bolivia Group, UK
Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, UK
Asociacion Espoir Chiapas / Esperanza Chiapas, France
Edinburgh Chiapas Solidarity Group, Scotland
Food Sovereignty Association SW, UK
Grupo Les trois passants, Paris, France
Gruppe B.A.S.T.A., Münster, Germany
KIPTIK, UK
La plataforma de solidaridad con chiapas y guatemala de Madrid, Spain
London Mexico Solidarity Group, UK
Manchester Zapatista Solidarity Group, UK
Plataforma Vasca de Solidaridad con Chiapas
Red Ya-Basta-Netz de Alemania, Germany
UK Zapatista Solidarity Network
West Yorkshire Zapatista Solidarity Group, UK
Zapatista Solidarity Group – Essex, UK
Zapsoluk, UK
Groups outside Europe:
Casa de Cultura Obrera, Tijuana
Comité de la Palabra Verdadera del Oeste de Colombia
Wellington Zapatista Support Group, New Zealand
Individuals:
Adam Bailey, UK
A MacDonald, UK
Anita Payne, UK
Davey Flynn, UK
Deborah Cobbett, UK
Eileen Foley, UK
E. Lewis, UK
Esther MacDonald, UK
Gaia Capogna, Italy
Iris S. Fiala, Austria
Jane Colleau, UK
Jane Nicholls, UK
Jaime Pastor, profesor de Ciencia Política, Spain
J. Davis, UK
J. Sorrell, UK
Margaret Gough, UK
Maria Gomez, UK
Michael Difiore, UK
Michael Gough, UK
Nancy Orrell, UK
Paul Stevens, Open University, UK
P. Cretella, UK
R. Alderton, UK
Rebecca Aylett, UK
Ses Harley, UK
S. Jailler, UK
Stefano Ba’, Manchester
StJohn Mauger, UK
Trevor Randall, UK
Outside Europe:
Alicia Monsech, Asistente Social, Argentina resident in Australia
Julie Webb-Pullman, Wellington, New Zealand
María Cristina Güena- Argentina
Odín Ávila Rojas, Doctorado de Ciencias Sociales-UAM Xochimilco
Valentín M. Mendoza, Quezon City, Philippines
1st July, 2013
**********************************************************************
From London: In memory of Juan Vázquez Guzmán: Uniting our struggles at the People’s Assembly
Over 4,000 people from a wide variety of groups and organizations gathered in Westminster Central Hall, London, on Saturday June 22nd for the first People’s Assembly against Austerity. One of the main messages from this event was the need for groups to unite in the struggle against capitalism, and the suffering, destruction and displacement it causes. This made it an ideal location to spread awareness of the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán as a result of his tireless dedication to the defense of our Mother Earth and the land, territory and rights of his people from the indigenous Tzeltal community of San Sebastián Bachajón. This is honored in the Week of Worldwide Action: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!” taking place from June 25th to July 2nd.
While the main purpose of the People’s Assembly was the struggle against the politics of austerity and endless war, it is all part of the same struggle against injustice, inequality, exclusion, and for dignity, freedom and true democracy. The starting point for all these struggles is from the local, the community of neighbourhood, sowing the seeds of peace and justice from the grassroots. The Assembly called for a programme of resistance and solidarity, and so do the people of Bachajón. Juan Vázquez Guzmán loved to visit compas in other locations, and to learn of and share their struggles. “We are fighting for an alternative future for this generation and for those that come after us,” says the declaration from the Assembly; this statement applies to both movements, to all our resistances.
“It is possible”, wrote political analyst Raúl Zibechi in support of the Week of Worldwide Action, “to weave bridges between those who are different if we recognize their differences…. If we mix the resistances, making the cause of each one into our cause… We invite you to continue building a new and different world, one with room for all…”
Juan Vázquez Guzmán gave his life for the land. May we all remember him and keep in him our hearts in whatever place or struggle we may be. Hasta la Victoria siempre.
************************************************************************
Wellington group takes part in the “Week of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!”
By Julie Webb-Pullman
At lunchtime today members of the Wellington Zapatista Support held a candlelight vigil outside the Mexican Embassy in Wellington as part of the “Week of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!”
After constructing a small shrine with flowers and candles in remembrance of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, an indigenous community leader assassinated in April, the group hand-delivered a letter to the Mexican Ambassador to New Zealand, demanding that Guzman’s killers be brought to justice, and an end to the blatant abuses of rights of the Tzeltal communities of San Sebastián Bachajón.
The text of the letter is as follows:
Her Excellency Ms Rosaura Leonora Rueda Gutierrez
Ambassador
Embassy of Mexico
Wellington
NEW ZEALAND
27 June 2013
Dear Madam
We, the Wellington Zapatista Support Group, have been following with concern Mexican Federal, State and Municipal responses to the civil resistance in defence of their land by the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to The Other Campaign in the Agua Azul region of Chiapas.
Since 2007, the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón have suffered violence and repression at the hands of Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI)-backed authorities and paramilitary organizations. Their resistance to the take-over of Tzeltal traditional lands for transnational projects, particularly the site of the Agua Azul waterfalls which the ejidatarios have been responsibly and sustainably managing for many years, has placed them squarely in the firing line of those who seek to dispossess them of their lands for commercial gain.
Concerted attempts to break up the community and its resistance began in 2009, with the detention of eight ejidatarios and adherents to the Other Campaign by state and federal police, and the arrest and vicious assault of Ricardo Lagunes at a PRI paramilitary checkpoint after he left a meeting in Bachajón. Two years later in 2011, 117 ejidatarios were arbitrarily detained by police during an eviction attempt at the toll booth at the entrance to the Agua Azul area. Ten, including Pérez Álvaro, remained political prisoners for an extended period of time.
Physical violence and repression have been coupled with legal and judicial abuses, including court decisions denying the rights of ejidatarios, and their arrests and eviction in 2011 enabling authorities to take control of the collectively-owned lands.
The ongoing assaults on Bachajón autonomy culminated on the night of April 24, 2013 in the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán in the doorway of his home.
Guzmán, Secretary General of the three centres of the ejido since April 2010, was riddled with six bullets after answering his door – the assailant fled the scene in a red pick-up, and no-one has yet been charged with his murder.
Hugo Blanco, director of Peruvian magazine Lucha Indígena, this week noted the participation of the rogue state of Israel, notorious for its impunity for 65 years of crimes against humanity and human rights abuses of Palestinians, in assisting the Mexican state to repress its indigenous peoples in Chiapas. “So far there has been no progress in the investigations into the perpetrators of the crime; on the contrary, harassment and persecution are constant. A few days after the murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, Jorge Luis Llaven Abarca, Secretary of Security and Civil Protection in the State of Chiapas, announced the training that the Israeli Ministry of Defense in Mexico will provide for the local police,” he wrote.
This does not augur well, either for the bringing before justice of the killers of Juan Guzmán, or for the protection of the collectively-owned lands of the indigenous Tzeltal from the ‘tourarism’ being practised by transnational business interests.
In this, the “Week of Worldwide Action: Juan Vazquez Guzman Lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!” the Wellington Zapatista Support Group adds its voice to the international chorus demanding justice for Juan Vázquez Guzmán, and in support of the struggle of the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón for their rights.
We demand:
1. a full investigation into the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán in the doorway of his home on the evening of April 24, 2013, and punishment of those responsible;
2. The release of ejidatarios Antonio Estrada Estrada (prisoner in CERSS 17, Playas de Catazajá, Chiapas), Miguel Vázquez Deara (prisoner in CERSS 16, Ocosingo, Chiapas) and Miguel Demeza Jiménez (prisoner in CERSS 14, El Amate);
3. Respect for the right of the Tzeltal people of San Sebastián Bachajón to self-determination and to exercise their autonomy as stipulated in Agreement No. 169 regarding indigenous and tribal peoples in independent countries United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the San Andrés Accords, Document 1, 3. 1. Document 2, II, IV (2. 3.); Document 3.1 (c, d); Document 1, Principle of the New Relationship 5;
4. Respect for their right to use and enjoy their natural resources, which as indigenous peoples they have protected for centuries, as referenced in Agreement No. 169 regarding indigenous and tribal peoples in independent countries, pursuant to article 13.2 United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and San Andrés Accords 1.4 B. 2.; Document 1, Principle of the New Relationship 2; and
5. The immediate withdrawal of all military, paramilitary, and police forces from the entire region, such that the natural and national treasure of Agua Azul is returned to the common ownership from which it has been wrested, and the rights of the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón are upheld.
Sincerely,
The Wellington Zapatista Support Group
“¡Juan Vázquez Guzmán Vive!”
“¡La Lucha de Bachajón Sigue!”
**********************************************************************
Bachajón suffers a campaign of harassment since 2009
** The cases of assassination and incarceration are an example
** Indigenous adherents to the Sexta endorse demands for justice
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, June 29, 2013
The resistance of San Sebastián Bachajón’s ejido owners and adherents to the Sexta is part of various stories that are all only one, from the unpunished assassination in April of their leader Juan Vázquez Guzmán, to the liberation this week of Miguel Vázquez Deara, falsely accused, a prisoner in Ocosingo for more than two years. And the judicial persecution underway against Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Demeza Jiménez, secluded respectively in Playas de Catazajá and El Amate, also because of ministerial montages and torture. This, and more, they confirm today, is the price that they pay for the defense of their territory.
The press conference of the ejido owners this Friday at the Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Human Rights Center (Frayba) confirms that each individual case is the result of the same governmental campaign, since 2009, to tear apart this historic Tzeltal community of Chilón (municipality). This is a community which is persecuted. Because it resists.
Domingo Pérez, representative of the ejido owners of the Sexta puts commemorating Juan, the assassinated leader, [during] these days on the same level as the joy of receiving Vázquez Deara free. He, on taking the word, demands the freedom of his two other compañeros, “because their families are suffering without them, and they are suffering in prison for no reason.”
Marta Demeza Jiménez says, about her brother Miguel, a prisoner in El Amate: “He is an honest person, honorable, a worker, unjustly imprisoned since 2010.” And in reference to the strange decision of Judge Ricardo Alfonso Morcillo Moguel, of Tuxtla Gutiérrez, who instead of resolving the indigenous prisoner’s appeal, sent it to the city of Jalapa, Veracruz; the farthest that he could. Marta points out: “It is a bad decision by Judge Morcillo, he cannot wash his hands of it as if he were afraid of the government and public opinion.”
Isabel Hernández Deara, Antonio Estrada Estrada’s wife, insists on the innocence of her compañero, a prisoner since 2011 on false charges of armed robbery. “They did ‘torturation’ on him so that he would confess. We are poor and don’t have [money] to pay for justice. Those who are really guilty, who do have [money] to pay, are free.” (There was no irony in her words). Something that complicates Antonio’s process is that, as part of what his defense from Frayba calls the ministerial “montage,” they “planted” a weapon for the exclusive use of the armed forces on the indigenous man, and this charge is a federal crime.
Not even the liberation of Vázquez Deara is definitive. As soon as the judge in Ocosingo dictated the release order on Wednesday, June 26, accepting that “the elements for this prosecution never existed,” as Frayba explains, the prosecutor of the public ministry in Ocosingo immediately appealed the decision.
Domingo Pérez Alonso remembers that Juan Vázquez, before being killed, dedicated himself to following up directly on his imprisoned compañeros, and “was very aware of their families.” He recalled that the paramilitary harassment, which had seemed to have been in the past, intensified again during the government of Juan Sabines Guerrero. He places responsibility for the crime on the current state government and the pro-government leader Francisco García.
Meanwhile, from Oaxaca, the writer Gustavo Esteva once again added himself to those who support the people of the Sexta in San Sebastián: “We must bear the current state of affairs with fortitude. Those who should be monitoring compliance with the law are dedicated to violating it. Those who have the legal power to use violence to protect the citizens are using it against them. The legal machinery systematically ridicules justice, and dresses up despotism in the cloak of mock courts. It is absurd to keep talking about the rule of law and democracy when things are like they are now.
“This is where we are: in an undeclared state of emergency in to which all the vices and evils of injustice fall, all the horrors that must not see justice. ‘Here in Chiapas’, Juan Vázquez Guzmán once said, ‘law and justice do not exist, rather the government imposes its mandate’.”
Esteva, a contributor to La Jornada, concludes: “Far from impelling us into to paralysis or despair, this unbearable situation impels us to take the initiative and nourish our hope. Being faced with the crimes and impunities of the bad government boosts the energy of those who, inspired and encouraged by Juan, decide to carry the struggle forward and join in solidarity with many other compañeros and compañeras everywhere who have decided to resist. The struggle of Juan and the people of San Sebastian Bachajón is clearly in the forefront of the battle which will define our destiny.”
———————————————————————-
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Sunday, June 30, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/06/30/politica/017n1pol
English translation by the Chiapas Support Committee for the: International Zapatista Translation Service, a collaboration of the: Chiapas Support Committee, California, Wellington Zapatista Support Group, UK Zapatista Solidarity Network.*********************************************************
Lawyer accuses judge of “getting rid of” the case of a Tzeltal indigenous as a reprisal
** From a courtroom in Tuxtla Gutiérrez he turned over the case to a tribunal in Jalapa
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, June 28, 2013
A Chiapas judge, Ricardo Alfonso Morcillo Moguel, decided “to arbitrarily rid himself of the responsibility of resolving the case” of Miguel Demeza Jiménez, a prisoner and adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle from San Sebastián Bachajón, imprisoned in El Amate. The judge preferred to turn it over to a regional tribunal in Jalapa, Veracruz, the defense lawyer for the indigenous man reported.
In the opinion of the lawyer Ricardo Lagunes Gasca, the maneuver “can be considered a reprisal because of the public visibility the case was given through the notes published by La Jornada on 13th June and because of the communications of solidarity that collectives sent on 18th June demanding the freedom of Demeza Jiménez.”
This, he adds, “helps to ensure that those responsible for the procuring and imparting of justice in Chiapas are unprepared for their acts and decisions to be publically evaluated, since they prefer to preserve the anonymity of their actions, in total contravention of a democratic position and of the constitutional reforms of 2008 and 2011.”
This Wednesday, June 26, the Tzeltal prisoner’s defense lawyer went to the fifth district court in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, to follow up on protective order (amparo) 1478/2012, “with respect to the constitutional hearing held on June 18, 2013 by Judge Morcillo Moguel.”
Demeza Jiménez’ defender was verbally informed by Martín Alfonso Martínez Molina, the planning secretary, that on June 20th, “the matter was sent to the first district court of the auxiliary center for the fourth region” with its seat in Jalapa. “This determination indicated that the complainants were not notified and that it was made unilaterally for the relief of the issues.”
All this, “even though, on the day of the constitutional hearing, Judge Morcillo Moguel, in the presence of the planning secretary Martínez Molina, indicated that they would meticulously study the matter for its resolution as soon as possible,” says the defense lawyer, when “suddenly two days later they decide to arbitrarily get rid of the responsibility for resolving the case.”
The change of jurisdiction for the resolution of the amparo “represents one more violation of his human rights to a fair judgment and to access to independent, impartial, prompt and expeditious justice to resolve the unconstitutionality of his detention, derived from an accusation by the Office of the Special Counsel against Organized Crime, built on items of illegal evidence and in violation of his human rights.”
Lagunes Gasca anticipated that: “in the next few days” he will go to the auxiliary center in Jalapa to follow up on the case.
Of the other two prisoners of the Sexta who are also residents of San Sebastián Bachajón, besides Demeza Jiménez, Miguel Vázquez Guzmán went free this week in Ocosingo, and Antonio Estrada Estrada remains imprisoned in Playas de Catazajá. They are similar cases of the arbitrary and unfounded application of justice. In all three cases there is evidence that the charges were fabricated as a political reprisal for the resistance of the indigenous people in their region.
———————————————————-
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Saturday, June 29, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/06/29/politica/018n1pol
English translation by the Chiapas Support Committee for the: International Zapatista Translation Service, a collaboration of the: Chiapas Support Committee, California, Wellington Zapatista Support Group, UK Zapatista Solidarity Network.
***********************************************************
Judge decrees order for release of an indigenous activist
** He is a defender of communal lands at the Agua Azul Waterfalls
** Miguel Vázquez was forced to confess to crimes
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
On Wednesday, Miguel Vázquez Deara, “political prisoner” and adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle from the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido, was set free in Ocosingo, Chiapas. When the deadline for determining his legal situation expired, the mixed judge of first instance of the judicial district with residence in Ocosingo decreed the release order in his favor.
Like his two other compañeros, still prisoners in Playas de Catazajá and El Amate, Vázquez Deara has been legally persecuted by the authorities, the Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Human Rights Center (Frayba) maintained this Tuesday, through acts whose purpose is “to undermine the actions for the defense of territory that the ejido has been undertaking for several years.”
Vázquez Deara was arrested in September 2011, based on a denunciation “fabricated by officialists (government supporters) who have interests in the Waterfalls of Agua Azul, and forced under torture to sign a self-incriminating statement.”
On November 22, 2012, a final sentence for the alleged crimes of robbery with violence and criminal association had been issued, and he was sentenced to seven years and nine months in prison. The sentence was appealed, and after inexplicable delay of five months for the court to send the file from Ocosingo to San Cristóbal de las Casas – a distance covered in an hour and a half–, the magistrates of the mixed hall of the Supreme Tribunal of Justice in San Cristóbal ordered the rehearing of the proceedings as far as the preparatory statement, “considering that there were violations of his rights to an adequate defense”, and yesterday morning the judge decided to free him.
The Frayba exemplifies the case “as one of those which show that in Chiapas access to the prompt, speedy and impartial administration of justice is denied”, as well as the lack of adequate defense for indigenous people, and of “the application of the law in accordance with the principle of the presumption of innocence.” In this case those who “organize in defense of land rights, self-determination and autonomy are criminalized.”
On September 26, 2011, Vázquez Deara, then a community police officer, was detained by agents assigned to the District Prosecutor for the Jungle Zone and the State Preventive Police, while he was working in the city of Palenque. He himself has said that Juan Álvaro Moreno, of the Green Ecologist Party of Mexico (PVEM, its initials in Spanish), was accompanying the police. This individual belongs to the pro-government group from which the ejido owners of the Sixth “have received threats and harassment, due to their struggle in defense of their land and territory.”
Vázquez Deara was not assisted during his ministerial statement by a defender or a translator who was familiar with his language and culture, which is contrary to the provisions of the second article of the constitution.
He himself says: “I remember that I went up some stairs where they were asking me who my robber compañeros are; it was like a patio, I answered in Tzeltal, saying that I did not know how to speak Spanish. The police said to me: ‘talk, you son of a prick, we are going to prepare a beating for you.’
“They handcuffed my hands, my feet, and covered my mouth with a handkerchief and my eyes with a black rag, they undressed me completely. Afterwards they put a bag on my head, hit me in the stomach with a gun butt and also in the chest. The hit the nape of my neck with a closed fist, gave me a weapon and took photos of me. Later a police agent arrived who asked where the person shot at the gravel pit was, and they accused me of robbery of a small truck and many crimes.”
Immediately afterwards, he was obliged to sign a ministerial statement which, according to Frayba, “became the principal evidence that self-incriminated him, and served as the basis for fabricating other crimes against him which he never committed.”
———————————————–
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Thursday, June 27, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/06/27/politica/007n1pol
English translation by the Chiapas Support Committee for the: International Zapatista Translation Service, a collaboration of the: Chiapas Support Committee, California, Wellington Zapatista Support Group, UK Zapatista Solidarity Network.
***********************************************************************
Tributes to Juan Vazquez Guzman from Colombia and England
“Your life is like a seed of hope and rebellion that is growing in the hearts of every child, woman and man from San Sebastian Bachajon and in the hearts of compañeros and compañeras from around the world.”
Groups in England and Colombia chose Tuesday the 25th of June to hold special events in tribute to Juan Vázquez Guzmán, the assassinated activist and much-loved defender of the human rights, land and territory of his community of San Sebastián Bachajón. The day marks both Juan’s birthday and the start of the Week of Worldwide Action “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!” in support of San Sebastián Bachajón and in honour of Juan Vázquez Guzmán.
The Committees of the True Word from Southwest England and Western Colombia have maintained the links developed between them during the Worldwide Echo in Support of the Zapatistas Campaign, and agreed to both hold a similar session on this day, aiming to remember and honour Juan, his dignified life and work, and to disseminate information about the struggle of the adherents to the Sixth Declaration from San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, Mexico.
The Colombian group started their session with a minute’s silence in memory of Juan, before sharing information about him, and then, as well as possible with a faltering electricity supply, watching him speak on screen through some of the videomessages sent from the community. This was followed by studying and discussing the violent and repressive attempts by the Mexican government to displace the residents of this indigenous community from their ancestral lands, in order to further the profit of transnational hotel groups wanting to develop an expensive resort complex at the waterfalls there. The group used materials from the campaign website https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com/en-ingles/.
The English Committee joined with members of the Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group for their meeting, which followed a similar programme of remembering and honoring Juan and discussing and sharing the history of his struggle. The Dorset group made use of materials they have prepared to use for a presentation about San Sebastián Bachajón at a Latin America forum on Thursday.
They read the words of Juan’s compas: “Beloved Compañero Juan, you are the heart of the people and you live within every woman and child who defends their people and fights for justice. You gave your life for the Mother Earth….your word will be etched in our minds and we will follow your example in our lives.”
All three groups wish to send words of solidarity to the compañeras and compañeros of Bachajón, and of encouragement to others to continue with mobilisations throughout the week.
**********************************************************************
The Week of Worldwide Action: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!” began on June 25th
To our sisters and brothers adherents to the Sexta of the Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón:
To our Zapatista sisters and brothers:
To our compañer@s of the Sexta:
To the Committees of the True Word throughout the world:
To the adherents to the International Campaign in Defense of El Barrio and our allies everywhere:
To civil society in Mexico and the world:
To the independent, free and autonomous media
Compañeras and compañeros:
Please receive many embraces from Movement for Justice in El Barrio, Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, the Committee of the True Word from Kolkata, India and the Committee of the True Word from Alisal.
The Week of Worldwide Action: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!” began on June 25th, the birthday of our beloved compa Juan Vázquez Guzmán.
We want to share with you the wonderful response we have received from throughout the world to our convocation in in honor of Juan Vázquez Guzmán and in support of San Sebastián Bachajón, a response which has truly touched our hearts.
Groups and collectives from in all five continents have now confirmed their participation.
Activities will take place in Mexico, South Africa, India, the Philippines, Peru, Australia, Uruguay, Puerto Rico, Canada, Brazil, Ecuador, England, Scotland, Colombia, Germany, Italy, Austria, New Zealand and the United States during the Week of Worldwide Action: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, The Bachajón Struggle Continues!” from Tuesday, June 25 to Tuesday, July 2, 2013.
The events scheduled include street stalls, video conferences, information sessions, protests, presentation of letters and pronouncements, celebrations of mass and other gatherings in honour of Juan’s life, presentations at forums, street theatre, publication of articles, reflections, reports and translations, distribution of leaflets, creation of artistic works, musical performances and video screenings.
From the bottom of our hearts we would like to thank these compas from different corners of the planet for joining the campaign to spread awareness of the dignified struggle of our beloved compas from San Sebastián Bachajón, and to honor the memory of Juan Vázquez Guzmán.
To our beloved compa Juan Vázquez Guzmán, we embrace you, knowing that you will always be with us. We will always be thankful to you for having given so much inspiration to each of us in our own struggles.
The seed of resistance you nourished in these indigenous soils will continue to grow and flourish watered by the love and the passion for struggle you have given us.
You will never be alone.
We believe that everyone should know of your dignified life and of the dignified resistance of your people.
We demand a full investigation of your assassination, and punishment of those responsible.
Your voice will not be silenced, nor will the work of your heart be ended.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán, compañero, we will remember you on June 25th, the day of your birthday. We call on all people of good heart to celebrate your life and your dignified struggle.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán, beloved compa and brother, guardian of the land, the struggle continues.
Land, Freedom and Justice for the Ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón!
Freedom and Justice for Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Demeza Jiménez from San Sebastián Bachajón!
With embraces of Love and Solidarity,
Movement for Justice in El Barrio
Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, England
Committee of the True Word from Kolkata, India
Committee of the True Word from Alisal, US
***************************************************************************
The Mexican state turns life into death to accumulate wealth: Zibechi
The writer says that the murder of Juan Vázquez is a punishment for defending the land
Hermann Bellinghausen
La Jornada, Wednesday June 26, 2013
The murder in April of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, representative of the adherents of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon jungle in the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, is “is a punishment of the community for defending the waterfalls of Agua Azul from tourist speculation”, said the Uruguayan writer and journalist Raúl Zibechi in a message to the international organizers of the week of worldwide action in support of the struggle of the Tzeltal people, which began today.
“The goal of capital and of the Mexican state is to use the gifts of nature to accumulate wealth, or to turn life into death. The war against the peoples to appropriate nature is turning the population of San Sebastian Bachajón into military targets. Juan was one of them, for having been prominent in the defense of the community”, emphasised Zibechi, and drew a revealing parallel with the African-American poet Audre Lorde.
“Death also has a color, a class and a geographical location. Like life. Like pain. When I was looking for what to say to the compas who are organizing the week of action in tribute to Juan Vázquez Guzmán, I found the testimony of an African American woman, black and, therefore, poor, who was born in Harlem in the terrible decade of the1930s, when the rich offloaded the crisis on to those from below.
This woman was called Audre Lorde, she was a poet and, among many other things, she said: ‘For us, the whole of life is tinged with violence. We not only face it in the front line, or at midnight in dark alleys, or in places where we dare to express our resistance. Violence is the very fabric of our lives.’ ”
Zibechi considers Lorde and Vázquez Guzmán “siblings in blood who became brother and sister five centuries ago somewhere in this world, while the Juans were resisting the conquistadores and the Audres were seeking to escape from the slaveholders. The resistances united and continue to unite the people of the color of the earth. Juan and Audre send us, from somewhere, the message that it is possible to unite the resistances, to weave bridges between Indians and blacks, between men and women, between people who live in the North and people who live in the South.”
Joining in solidarity with the ejidatarios of the Sixth along with other committed intellectuals, like the Peruvian Hugo Blanco, the analyst said: “It is possible to weave bridges between those who are different if we recognize their differences. If we do not judge them. If we mix the resistances, making the cause of each one into our cause. Audre defined herself as “black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet”. Juan’s smile and his love for the people of his community, San Sebastián Bachajón, represents a program for life which he adhered to strictly until his final day.”
Addressing those who are “not Tzeltal like Juan, or black like Audre”, he said that “we can join together in fellowship with them in multiple resistances, and that from this fellowship, and only from it, a new, different world will be born, one with room for all the colors, from the distinct and intense colors of the earth to the pale colors of the cold lands. And that in this fellowship there will be a heart with the name of Juan; and with Juan we will name the heart of all.”
Meanwhile, Alberto Patishtán and the other prisoners from the Voice of el Amate and Solidarity with the Voice of el Amate in the San Cristobal de las Casas prison, remembered the murdered leader, who on Tuesday would have reached his 33rd birthday: “He was and is a brave and exemplary man who fought for the wellbeing of his people defending the land that belongs to Bachajón. Our brother always accompanied us and will accompany us to demand our freedoms stolen by the bad system.”
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/06/26/index.php?section=politica&article=018n1pol
**************************************************************************
Bachajón ejidatarios declare themselves in struggle to defend their lands
** They pay homage to Juan Vázquez, the leader assassinated two months ago
** They accuse the Chiapas Secretary of Government and “his gang” of participating in the conflict
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
“Here we continue in struggle, resisting with hope to defend our mother land from dispossession by this accursed government which only wants to sow terror and destruction in our communities. The bad governments kill and imprison those who struggle for better living conditions for their people. For this reason, two months ago they ordered the assassination of our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán by their hired assassins while he was resting quietly at home; the treacherous government wickedly ordered his murder to put an end to our struggle.
But they were wrong, because we are here, we are staying here and we are not going to leave our land which is the birthplace of our mothers and fathers, our grandfathers and grandmothers who also fought and gave their lives for the mother earth.”
With these words, San Sebastián Bachajón residents sent a message from Cumbre Nah Choj, headquarters of the adherents to the Sixth in this ejido in the municipality of Chilón, Chiapas. They paid homage there, with prayers and traditional music, to their fallen compañero, and placed responsibility on the Secretary of Government for the state, Noé Castañón León, for the aggressions and dispossessions which they have suffered since 2010.
“But we already know the perverse game the bad governors will play, because they are going to say they will give justice to Juan Vázquez Guzmán , that they will make investigations and that those responsible will be apprehended; but are they going to put Noé Castañon Leon and his crew in prison for what they did to Juan Vázquez Guzmán and for the plundering of San Sebastián Bachajón?
They are quietly doing their dirty deeds, abusing their power and money, buying judges like José del Carmen Constantino Avendaño from the seventh district of tuxtla, so he will throw out our amparo 274/2011, ridiculing our people.”
They pointed out that the Secretary of Government, whose action in this conflict has been very direct, and “his gang,” “are a bunch of freeloaders who live off public money”.
This government, they accused, “is corrupt and mediocre because they came to power through buying votes, taking advantage of the poverty of the people, for the bad government it is a blessing that we are poor; their programs – crusades against hunger, Opportunities, Procampo –are crumbs to keep us in misery and so we have no autonomy to be able to decide what is best for our peoples.”
“They bought ejido authorities”
They denounced the “buying” of the ejido authorities, like Francisco Guzmán Jiménez (alias Goyito) “who betrays his people just to eat the crumbs thrown to him by his boss the government (which) also fraudulently imposed the new commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gómez and uses the indigenous brothers of Agua Azul as paramilitaries to strike blows at the resistance in San Sebastián and at the (Zapatista) compañeros in Bolom Ajaw.”
The ejido owners demanded the immediate liberation of their “political prisoners” Antonio Estrada Estrada, Miguel Vázquez Deara and Miguel Demeza Jiménez. The first two –imprisoned in Playas de Catazajá and Ocosingo respectively– “were identified by people close to the ex-commissioner Guzmán Jiménez: Carmen Aguilar Gómez Primero, Juan Álvaro Moreno, Manuel Jiménez Moreno and Miguel Ruiz Hernández.” This allowed them to be “taken by the State and Federal Police to be tortured and to fabricate the crimes of robbery with violence and carrying a firearm.” They have been prisoners since 2011.
Demeza Jiménez, held in the El Amate Prison since 2010, “was tortured and held without charges by the specialized office against organized crime, falsely accused of robbery and kidnapping”.
Recently, as a result of their appeal, they reviewed the proceeding and on June 26 their legal situation should be resolved, while on June 20 the authorities “cancelled” Estrada Estrada’s face-to-face meetings with the state police who detained him illegally, “because there was no Tzeltal translator or public defender, (thus) violating his rights” once again.
—————————————————
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Tuesday, June 25, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/06/25/politica/016n1pol
English translation by the Chiapas Support Committee for the: International Zapatista Translation Service, a collaboration of the: Chiapas Support Committee, California, Wellington Zapatista Support Group, UK Zapatista Solidarity Network
**************************************************************************
From Peru: Letter from Hugo Blanco regarding “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!”
Compañeros and compañeras, a request comes from Peru from our compañero Hugo Blanco, Director of the publication “Lucha Indígena”, (“Indigenous Struggle”) to make us part of the campaign “In defense of our Mother Earth. In defense of the beautiful waterfalls of Agua Azul. In tribute to Juan Vázquez Guzmán…” or perhaps, rather, it is a plea for us all to join together in the “Week of Worldwide Action: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!”
Compañero Hugo shows us two opposing worlds: the world of so-called “civilization” which, with its “attacks on nature”, is every day sowing the extermination of human beings, and the world of those who are defending our “Mother Earth” in order to finally harvest the survival of humanity. Without any doubt, “the indigenous peoples of the 5 continents” and the “defenders of nature”, like Juan Vázquez Guzmán, belong to the second group.
Communities like San Sebastián Bachajón, which defend the natural world, and compañeras and compañeros like the adherents to the Sixth are the ones who become part of and strengthen the world of the defenders of our “Mother Earth.” This is the world which Hugo is inviting us to join.
Here is Hugo’s letter:
Why our Tzeltal brothers and sisters from San Sebastián Bachajón fight
Human beings, like all living things, depend on nature, we are part of her. An attack on her is also an attack on humanity.
Unfortunately, so-called “civilization” is leading to the attacks on nature increasing all the time. In the name of “progress” and “development”, neoliberal capitalism is taking this aggression to a level which is leading to the extinction of our species. The aggression takes many forms, I will mention just a few: global warming caused by the emission of greenhouse gases, deforestation of rainforests, open cast mining which robs water from small-scale agriculture, hydroelectric plants which flood large areas to build dams, agribusinesses which kill the soil with monocultures and chemicals, in order to poison us with GMOs.
Even though this is an attack against all humanity, much of humanity does not feel this way, and even supports the attack, calling the defenders of nature “ignorant people” who are “against development and progress”.
Those who do feel it very deeply and who struggle in defense of their Mother Earth, even sacrificing their lives, are the indigenous peoples of the 5 continents.
An example of this are the Tzeltal communities of San Sebastian Bachajón, fighting in defense of their land, their territory and the beautiful waterfalls of Agua Azul, against the aggression of transnational tourist hotel companies.
The attacks in this case began with Governor Juan Sabines (who inherited a debt of 40 million dollars and was charged with several offenses, including conspiracy, organized crime, illicit enrichment, torture and solitary confinement) and are continued by the current Governor Manuel Velasco Coello, of the Green Ecological Party (this is not an irony, it really is the name of the party of this fierce attacker of nature). The favored transnationals would include: Norton Consulting INC and EDSA Construction.
The luxury hotels would have, among other things, golf courses, and charge from 300 to 800 U.S. dollars per night. This is why the aggression from the state and national government is so intense.
In early February 2011, the Agua Azul ticket booth which had been installed by the community to defend the waterfalls was evicted by means of a paramilitary operation headed by Juan Álvaro and Miguel Ruiz Hernández, leaders of the PRI and the Green Ecological party in the region. The following day 117 indigenous were arrested, ten of them on fabricated charges for crimes they did not commit, such as illegal deprivation of liberty, wounding, homicide, damage to roads and breach of the peace.
CONANP (the National Commission of Natural Protected Areas) is also participating in this business: it literally erased from the map the strip of land which is part of the ejido of San Sebastián.
Paramilitary groups from the PRI, PRD and PVEM have undertaken attacks against Zapatista support bases, and also against San Sebastián Bachajón.
Antonio Estrada, Miguel Vázquez and Miguel Demeza were imprisoned and tortured to make them plead guilty to crimes they did not commit. They remain imprisoned.
As part of the resistance, on February 19, 2011 a women’s caravan, consisting of members of different communities and social and civil organizations, went to the Agua Azul area “with the aim of observing the situation of the compañeros and to see and accompany the compañeras of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, (…) and to give voice to the women who are affected by the conflict which exists in the area and whose word also needs to be heard”.
The assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán
Juan Vazquez Guzman, former Secretary General of the adherents to the Other Campaign (La Sexta) in the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón, was murdered on Wednesday April 24th. At eleven o’clock that night unknown persons attacked him, firing the six bullets which took his life, according to the Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Center.
Neighbors in the region say that the attackers were waiting for Juan in front of his home aboard a double cab red pickup truck; after the crime they took the road leading to the municipal headquarters of Sitalá, which also gives access to the road to the municipalities of Ocosingo, Cancúc and Chilón.
So far there has been no progress in the investigations into the perpetrators of the crime; on the contrary, harassment and persecution are constant. A few days after the murder of Juan Vazquez Guzman, Jorge Luis Llaven Abarca, Secretary of Security and Civil Protection in the State of Chiapas, announced the training that the Israeli Ministry of Defense in Mexico will provide for the local police.
Ricardo Lagunes Gasca, legal representative of the ejidatarios, states: “No one has been arrested for the killing of Juan Vázquez Guzmán. The government is responsible, the government ordered his death. The three levels of government wanted to stop the compañero from doing his job. There is an ongoing criminal investigation, but there have been no arrests. The perpetrator escaped, it was planned. They were people who knew the place, they had planned their escape route. They killed him in the doorway of his house with six shots, one in the chest, three in the abdomen and one in each arm.”
Juan Vázquez Guzmán was born on the 25th of June. Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York and other organizations have agreed that on this day a week of actions of commemoration and protest will start, named: “Week of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues”.
In defense of our Mother Earth; in defense of the beautiful waterfalls of Agua Azul; in tribute to Juan Vázquez Guzmán. We join this campaign.
Hugo Blanco
Director of “Lucha Indigena” Peru
***************************************************************************
Worldwide Campaign:
“Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives!
The Bachajón struggle continues!”
https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com/en-ingles/
From Uruguay: Letter from Raúl Zibechi about the “Week of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!”
For all the sons, daughters and children of the Mother Earth, as our compa Raúl Zibechi suggests, it “is possible to weave bridges between those who are different if we recognize their differences … We invite you to continue building a new and different world, one with room for all the colors, from the distinct and intense colors of the earth to the pale colors of the cold lands.” Thank you, Compañero Raúl Zibechi.
Here is our compa’s letter:
To the Week of Worldwide Action: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!”
To the compañeros and compañeras from: Movement for Justice in El Barrio, Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, England, Committee of the True Word from Kolkata, India, and Committee of the True Word from Alisal.
Death also has a color, a class and a geographical location. Like life. Like pain.
When I was looking for what to say to the compas who are organizing the week of action in tribute to Juan Vázquez Guzmán, I found the testimony of an African American woman, black and, therefore, poor, who was born in Harlem in the terrible decade of the1930s, when the rich offloaded the crisis on to those from below.
This woman was called Audre Lorde, she was a poet and, among many other things, she said: “For us, the whole of life is tinged with violence. We not only face it in the front line, or at midnight in dark alleys, or in places where we dare to express our resistance. Violence is the very fabric of our lives.”
I feel that Audre Lorde and Juan Vázquez Guzmán are siblings in blood who became brother and sister five centuries ago somewhere in this world, while the Juans were resisting the conquistadores and the Audres were seeking to escape from the slaveholders. The resistances united and continue to unite the people of the color of the earth. Juan and Audre send us, from somewhere, the message that it is possible to unite the resistances, to weave bridges between Indians and blacks, between men and women, between people who live in the North and people who live in the South.
It is possible to weave bridges between those who are different if we recognize their differences. If we do not judge them. If we mix the resistances, making the cause of each one into our cause. Audre defined herself as “black, lesbian, mother, warrior, poet”. Juan’s smile and his love for the people of his community, San Sebastián Bachajón, represents a program for life which he adhered to strictly until his final day.
The death of Juan, the murder of Juan, is a punishment of the community for defending the waterfalls of Agua Azul from tourist speculation. The goal of capital and of the Mexican state is to use the gifts of nature to accumulate wealth, or to turn life into death. The war against the peoples to appropriate nature is turning the population of San Sebastian Bachajón into military targets. Juan was one of them, for having been prominent in the defense of the community.
I want to say to those who live in New York, in California, in England, India or anywhere in the world, or to those who live in Montevideo and Buenos Aires, and who are not Tzeltal like Juan, or black like Audre, that we can join together in fellowship with them in multiple resistances, and that from this fellowship, and only from it, a new, different world will be born, one with room for all the colors, from the distinct and intense colors of the earth to the pale colors of the cold lands. And that in this fellowship there will be a heart with the name of Juan; and with Juan we will name the heart of all.
Health and a good week of fellowship,
Raul Zibechi
Montevideo
June 23, 2013
***************************************************************************
Demand for Justice for Leader Assassinated in Bachajón
** This Monday they will offer a homage to Juan Vázquez Guzmán
** Tomorrow there will be a hearing about the dispossession of lands in the ejido
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
The Tzeltal ejido owners, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle in San Sebastián Bachajón, municipality of Chilón, Chiapas, demanded justice and not impunity for the assassination of their leader Juan Vázquez Guzmán on April 24 in the doorway of his home, in an act directly related to his role in the resistance against mega-tourism at the Agua Azul Waterfalls and in defense of the area of San Sebastián territory occupied by public force by means of illegal maneuvers, with the complicity of ejidal authorities.
They also demanded the freedom of three of their compañeros (Antonio Estrada, Miguel Vásquez and Miguel Demeza), each in different prisons under ridiculous charges which expose the reality of Chiapan justice, especially that of the public ministries and municipal governments (in this case, which is not the only one, those of Chilón and Ocosingo).
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (CIDH, its initials in Spanish) recently notified the ejido owners that, as a result of their petition for precautionary measures, sent on May 26, it has sent a request for information to the Mexican government about the dispossession in the ejido, the aggressions and threats.
Next Tuesday, the constitutional hearing for amparo (protective order) 274/2011 is scheduled before the seventh district judge in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, in order to to make a decision for the second time about the dispossession of the lands of the people of Bachajón, after the first decision was declared illegal by the Third Collegiate Tribunal when resolving the amparo in review no. 118/2013.
This Monday at Cumbre Nah Choj, headquarters of the adherents to the Sixth in San Sebastián, a homage to Vázquez Guzmán will be held “two months after his political assassination.” He would have been 33 years old on June 25. On this day the Worldwide Campaign Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón Struggle Continues will begin, convoked by the Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York and solidarity groups from the United Kingdom, Kolkata (India), Alisal (California) and Mexico, to which have been added other organizations like the Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity.
Solidarity activities are anticipated in South Africa, the Philippines, Peru, Australia, Italy, Uruguay, Puerto Rico, Canada, Brazil, Ecuador, Austria, New Zealand, England, Scotland, Colombia and Germany.
From Peru, Hugo Blanco, director of the magazine Lucha Indígena, pertinently commented: “So far there has been no progress in the investigations into the perpetrators of the crime; on the contrary, harassment and persecution are constant. A few days after the murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, Jorge Luis Llaven Abarca, Secretary of Security and Civil Protection in the State of Chiapas, announced the training that the Israeli Ministry of Defense in Mexico will provide for the local police.”
The three levels of government, he says, “wanted to stop the compañero from doing his job. There is an ongoing criminal investigation, but there have been no arrests. The perpetrator escaped. They were people who knew the place, they had a well-planned escape route,” and very probably official protection.
————————————————————-
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Monday, June 24, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/06/24/politica/018n1pol
English translation by the Chiapas Support Committee for the: International Zapatista Translation Service, a collaboration of the: Chiapas Support Committee, California, Wellington Zapatista Support Group, UK Zapatista Solidarity Network.
***************************************************************************
FROM THE EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO. 24 JUNE 2013
To the people of Mexico and the world
To the compañer@s adherents to the sixth declaration of the Lacandon Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To national and international human rights defenders
To the Good Government Juntas
To the Zapatista National Liberation Army
To the Network against Repression and for Solidarity
To the indigenous peoples in resistance
To public opinion
Compañeros and compañeras in struggle in Mexico and the world, we send combative greetings from the women and men of Bachajon. Here we continue in struggle, resisting with hope to defend our mother land from dispossession by this accursed government which only wants to sow terror and destruction in our communities.
The bad governments kill and imprison those who struggle for better living conditions for their people. For this reason, two months ago they ordered the assassination of our compañero Juan Vazquez Guzman by their hired assassins while he was resting quietly at home, but the treacherous government wickedly ordered his murder to put an end to our struggle, but they were wrong, because we are here, we are staying here and we are not going to leave our land which is the birthplace of our mothers and fathers, our grandfathers and grandmothers who also fought and gave their lives for the mother earth.
But we already know the perverse game the bad governors will play, because they are going to say they will give justice to Juan Vazquez Guzman, that they will make investigations and that those responsible will be apprehended; but are they going to put Noe Castañon Leon and his crew in prison for what they did to Juan Vazquez Guzman and for the plundering of San Sebastian Bachajón? They are quietly doing their dirty deeds, abusing their power and money, buying judges like Jose del carmen constantino Avendaño from the seventh district of tuxtla, so he will throw out our amparo 274/2011, playing games with our people who are peacefully resisting and defending their rights.
Noe Castañon Leon and his gang are a bunch of freeloaders who live off public money and taxes, who get rich at the expense of our suffering and through the exploitation of our work, their families put them in the government so that the people will keep them; for these reasons this government is corrupt and mediocre because they came to power through buying votes, taking advantage of the poverty of the people, for the bad government it is a blessing that we are poor, so they have their programs – crusades against hunger, opportunities, procampo – which are merely crumbs to keep us in poverty; they want us to remain in misery and to have no autonomy as peoples to be able to decide what is best for our peoples. This is why they buy the ejido authorities, such as Francisco Guzmán Jimenez (aka goyito) who betrays his people only to eat the few crumbs thrown to him by his patron the government, they have also fraudulently imposed the new ejidal commissioner Alejandro Moreno Gomez and they use our indigenous brothers from Agua Azul as paramilitaries to attack the resistance in San Sebastian Bachajon and of our compañeros at bolom ajaw.
Our compañero Juan Vazquez Guzman knew all about what the bad government was doing against our people, and while dreaming of seeing his people free from the oppression and abuse of the exploiters, he struggled for the autonomy and freedom of his people.
We demand the immediate release of our compañeros the political prisoners ANTONIO ESTRADA ESTRADA, MIGUEL VAZQUEZ DEARA and MIGUEL DEMEZA JIMENEZ, unjustly imprisoned by this bad government. Antonio Estrada Estrada, prisoner in Playas de Catazajá, and Miguel Vazquez Deara, prisoner in Ocosingo, were identified by people close to the former ejidal commissioner, Francisco Guzmán Jiménez (aka el goyito), who are Carmen Aguilar Gómez Primero, Juan Álvaro Moreno, Manuel Jiménez Moreno and Miguel Ruiz Hernández, to be taken away by the State and Federal Police to be tortured and charged with the fabricated crimes of robbery with violence and the possession of a firearm; they have been unjustly imprisoned since 2011. Miguel Demeza Jimenez, prisoner in el Amate, was tortured and put in solitary confinement (arraigado) by the specialized prosecutor against organized crime, falsely accused of robbery and kidnapping, and has been unjustly imprisoned since 2010.
Recently the compañero Miguel Vázquez Deara, as a result of his appeal, has had his case reviewed and on Wednesday June 26 his legal situation will be resolved; we demand that the joint judge of Ocosingo grants our compañero his freedom because he is innocent, he has been tortured and his crime fabricated. Also compañero Miguel Demeza Jimenez will soon have his amparo1478/2012 resolved by the fifth District Judge in tuxtla concerning the fabricated crime of robbery with violence of which he was accused by the prosecutor of organized crime; we demand his freedom. On June 20 our compañero Antonio Estrada Estrada had his charges cancelled from when the state police illegally arrested him, because there he had no Tzeltal translator or legal defender, grossly violating his rights, in addition to all the other injustices suffered by our fellow prisoners.
Compañero Juan, today we remember you with prayer and traditional 
music. Beloved compa Juan, you are now resting in a better life, you struggled and you gave your life for your people and for the release of the political prisoners, rest in peace because here we continue organized in the struggle against this terrible capitalist system; and your life is like a seed of hope and rebellion that is growing in the hearts of every child, woman and man from San Sebastian Bachajon and in the hearts of compañeros and compañeras from around the world.
We welcome with joy the words of solidarity and support from our compañeros and compañeras of Movement for Justice in El Barrio, Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, the Committees of the True Word from Kolkata and Alisal, Compañero Hugo Blanco of Lucha indígena in Perú, and Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity. Receive a combative embrace of solidarity from our people for your struggle.
Tomorrow, June 25th, the Worldwide Campaign ‘Juan Vazquez Guzman Lives, the Bachajón Struggle continues!’ will begin. Our cry for freedom and justice will be heard in every corner of the world, we ask compañeros and compañeras in their own ways to shout together for JUSTICE for our people and for FREEDOM for political prisoners ANTONIO ESTRADA ESTRADA, MIGUEL VAZQUEZ DEARA, MIGUEL DEMEZA JIMENEZ, ALBERTO PATISHTAN GOMEZ, ROSARIO DIAZ MENDEZ and for all the political prisoners in Mexico and the world.
From the northern region of Chiapas, receive an embrace from the women and men of San Sebastian Bachajón.
Respectfully
Land and Freedom!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
Freedom for Political Prisoners!
***************************************************************************
NEW COMMUNIQUE FROM SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON
SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, JUNE 17, 2013
JUAN VÁZQUEZ GUZMÁN LIVES!
THE BACHAJON STRUGGLE CONTINUES!
INVITATION
THE ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE OF THE EZLN FROM EJIDO SSB, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, INVITE THE FREE MEDIA AND SISTER ORGANIZATIONS TO ATTEND THE TRIBUTE TO THE MEMORY OF JUAN VÁZQUEZ GUZMÁN
WHICH WILL TAKE PLACE IN CUMBRE NACHOJ, GENERAL HEADQUARTERS OF THE SIXTH OF SSB ON MONDAY 24TH JUNE AT 9 O’CLOCK (HOUR OF GOD) (10 O’CLOCK SUMMER TIME)
FOR WHICH WE HAVE PLANNED THE FOLLOWING PROGRAM
9:00 A.M. PRAYER
9:30 to 11:00 PRESS CONFERENCE
11:00 to 12:00 TRADITIONAL MUSIC
THIS IS ALL SO WE WILL NOT FORGET THE MEMORY AND THE STRUGGLE OF COMPAÑERO JUAN
HIS WORD WILL REMAIN WITH US LIKE A SEED WHICH WILL GROW AND FLOURISH
FROM SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON IN THE NORTHERN ZONE RECEIVE OUR WARM GREETINGS AND EMBRACES
RESPECTFULLY
***************************************************************************
STATEMENT FROM THE UK ZAPATISTA SOLIDARITY NETWORK IN SUPPORT OF THE WEEK OF WORLDWIDE ACTION: “JUAN VÁZQUEZ GUZMÁN LIVES! THE BACHAJÓN STRUGGLE CONTINUES!” JUNE 25TH TO JULY 2ND, 2013.
The UK Zapatista Solidarity Network offers its full support to the Week of Worldwide Action: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!” from Tuesday, June 25th to Tuesday, July 2nd, 2013.
Through this initiative we hope both to help spread awareness of the dignified struggle of the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle from San Sebastián Bachajón, and to offer solidarity to our brothers and sisters there.
We are shocked and saddened by the brutal assassination of the community leader and human rights defender Juan Vázquez Guzmán and send our condolences to his family, friends and community.
We demand justice for his murder and a full investigation into its material and intellectual authors.
We know that Juan Vázquez Guzmán gave his life in the defence of the land and territory of San Sebastián Bachajón and of our Mother Earth against the ravages of the three levels of Mexican government and their allies in multinational corporations.
We know also that this struggle will continue.
You can read more about the campaign here:
https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com/en-ingles/
UK Zapatista Solidarity Network
June, 2013
Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group
Edinburgh Chiapas Solidarity Group
KIPTIK
London Mexico Solidarity Group
Manchester Zapatista Solidarity Group
West Yorkshire Zapatista Solidarity Group
Zapatista Solidarity Group – Essex
***************************************************************************
Pronouncement from
MOVEMENT FOR PEACE WITH JUSTICE AND DIGNITY
about the “Week of Worldwide Action “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!”
At the Palace of Fine Arts in Mexico City on the 19th of June, at the event convoked by Alberto Patishtán himself to mark 13 years of his unjust imprisonment, the following greeting was sent to the Worldwide Campaign: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!”
Mexico, Federal District; June 19, 2013
Once again, the indigenous peoples are being injured. It is outrageous that our indigenous compañeros die by assassination for defending their territory and the future of our Mother Earth from the hands of those whose lives are based on greed and violence, and who are trying to destroy everything that gives sense and meaning to life.
Juan stood out for his active involvement in the defense of human rights, he was an adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN), from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón; former secretary general of the Adherents to the Sixth in his ejido, he participated in the defense of territory and in the struggle for the release of political prisoners, adding his active and sustained efforts to organizing actions for the freedom of Professor Alberto Patishtán. On countless occasions he denounced the social and political violence in his ejido, which was generated by the government in order to weaken the ejidal organization and to consummate their dispossession from their lands in order to implement an ecotourism project. Since 2011, Juan followed closely the legal defense of the ejidal territory, denouncing from the start the lack of impartiality of the seventh district judge in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, and the complicity of the Chiapas State Council of Human Rights (ECHR) with Governor Juan Sabines Guerrero with the aim of ensuring their dispossession from their lands.
Juan left his cornfield, his coffee plantation, to his family, to his two young children and, of course left an irreparable void in his struggle and in the hearts of those who had the opportunity to learn from his steps. We send from here our sincere condolences to the community of San Sebastian Bachajón and his family, and send our greetings of solidarity to the campaign “Week of Worldwide Action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!”
From here we make our own the cry “Juan Vázquez Guzmán, your voice will not be silenced, nor will the work of your heart be ended”.
The murder of our compañero must not go unpunished. This country can no longer live without justice. But justice needs to be clearly seen, so that we can believe in it again. We will continue to demand this until it happens.
Movement for Peace with Justice and Dignity
Platform for original peoples
***************************************************************************
FROM ALISAL, US:
“JUAN VÁZQUEZ GUZMÁN LIVES, THE BACHAJÓN STRUGGLE CONTINUES!”
Greetings from the Community of Alisal, Salinas, CA, United States
The Committee of the True Word from Alisal has held its first event to provide information about the Week of Worldwide Action: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!”
The event took place on Thursday, June 13, 2013, at the Cesar E. Chávez public library in the city of Salinas, California. During this informative forum discussions took place about the murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, the struggle of the people of San Sebastián Bachajón, which is now also our struggle, for the defense of their ancestral lands, and the Week of Worldwide Action: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!”
The Committee of the True Word from Alisal has planned a series of events such as the screening of video messages from the people of Bachajón, and a mass on the 25th of June in celebration of the memory of Juan Vázquez Guzmán.
The struggle of Juan Vázquez Guzmán is now our struggle. Our will and our courage to join the call made by the people of San Sebastián Bachajón to defend their land and their lives is very great. We will show that the words which come from the united peoples are more powerful than the bullets of the governments and their henchmen.
You can read more about the worldwide campaign here:
https://vivabachajon.wordpress.com/
Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!
**************************************************************************
Pronouncement of Fuerza Indígena Chinanteca Kia-Nan regarding San Sebastián Bachajón
THE FUERZA INDIGENA CHINANTECA KIA-NAN. ADHERENT TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE CHIAPAS
IN SOLIDARITY WITH OUR BROTHERS AND SISTERS OF BACHAJON IN THEIR STRUGGLE FOR THE DEFENSE OF THE MOTHER EARTH AND TERRITORY, AGAINST TOURIST MEGAPROJECTS, DEVELOPED BY THE THREE LEVELS OF GOVERNMENT, FEDERAL, STATE, AND MUNICIPAL, WHO ARE AT THE SERVICE OF LARGE TRANSNATIONAL COMPANIES, WE ACCUSE THE THREE LEVELS OF GOVERNMENT, OF ALL THE ATTACKS, VIOLATIONS, ARRESTS, REPRESSION, AND IMPRISONMENT, WHICH OUR BROTHERS AND SISTERS OF BACHAJON ARE SUFFERING.
YOU ARE NOT ALONE. WE ARE WITH YOU IN YOUR STRUGGLES, FROM OUR TRENCHES WE ARE ALSO AGAINST DISPOSSESSION AND MEGAPROJECTS.
WE DEMAND JUSTICE FOR OUR BROTHERS AND SISTERS OF BACHAJON, WE DEMAND RESPECT FOR THE ORIGINAL PEOPLES WHO, THROUGH HISTORY, ARE THE TRUE OWNERS OF THEIR TERRITORIES.
TRANSNATIONAL CORPORATIONS OUT OF OUR COUNTRY
LONG LIVE THE NATIVE COMMUNITIES IN RESISTANCE.
LONG LIVE THE ZAPATISTA ARMY OF NATIONAL LIBERATION.
FUERZA INDIGENA CHINANTECA KIA-NAN, TUXTEPEC OAXACA, 4 JUNE 2013
**************************************************************************
Worldwide Campaign:
“Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives!
The Bachajón struggle continues!”
Preparing for the Week of Worldwide Action: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!”
from 25th June to 2nd July, 2013
Preparations have begun in Southern England for the forthcoming Week of Worldwide Action “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!” The purpose of the week is to remember the assassinated defender of the land, territory and human rights of his people, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, and to offer solidarity to the continuing struggle of the adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle from San Sebastián Bachajón against the theft of their ancestral lands. The Mexican government and its allies from transnational corporations aim to dispossess them in order to construct a luxury tourist development. It was as a leader of this struggle that Juan Vázquez Guzmán met his death.
Members of the Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, who have joined with Movement for Justice in El Barrio and the Committees of the True Word from Kolkata, India and Alisal to convoke the week of solidarity, decided to hold an Information-sharing Session, in order to better inform themselves and to make others aware of the history of this indigenous Tzeltal community in Chiapas, South-East Mexico.
The event started with everyone viewing a series of videomessages sent from the communal landholders of the community (ejido) of Bachajón in 2011. The murdered community activist is prominent in these short films, and it is clear how he inspired his compañeros. After this, the participants heard a summary of the ejido’s struggle, read some of the press articles and the communiqués from the ejido, and started a process of discussion of the implications of what is happening in Bachajón, how best to offer solidarity, and what actions can be undertaken during the week.
The Group was very happy to welcome members of the Committee of the True Word from Southwest England to the meeting. The good news is that the Committee has now decided to join the week of action.
One theme that emerged during the discussions, clearly of great interest to all the participants, was that of how we can all link our struggles, wherever in the world we may be. It is remarkable that this week of action has been convoked by groups from below and to the left from 3 continents. In many parts of the world indigenous people are dying, have died, and will die defending their land and territory and the future of their Mother Earth from the greed and violence of those who seek to destroy all that gives purpose and meaning to life.
Part of the group’s plan for the Week of Action is to try to make short presentations about San Sebastián Bachajón and Juan Vázquez Guzmán at conferences, seminars, workshops, forums and meetings already taking place in the area. Members have already attended a forum on the adverse effects of tourism on communities and environments, and discussed with some very responsive participants the planned “ecotourist” megaproject at Agua Azul, the theft and plunder of Bachajón’s common lands, and the murder of Juan. They plan to attend a meeting on Latin America next week.
It is hoped that many people from different corners of this planet will join together to mark the Week of Worldwide Action: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!” from 25th June to 2nd July, 2013
“Juan Vázquez Guzmán Your voice will not be silenced, nor will the work of your heart be ended.”
**************************************************************************
Week of Global Action, “Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Struggle of Bachajón Continues!”
Sipaz
In a 28 May press conference in Mexico City, ejidatarios from San Sebastián Bachajón denounced that “in our community the official ejidal authorities are manipulated by the government so as to facilitate the looting of our lands,” and “they have signed documents handing over our lands to the government, without the authorization of our general assembly; instead of being punished and taken to jail, they are protected and supplied by the bad government.” They recalled the acts which occurred on 2 February 2011, when they “entered violently to displace the comrades of our organization from the control-point that we built with much effort and for the benefit of the people; they robbed construction materials and cash, and then the next day arrested 117 of our comrades.”
The San Sebastián Bachajón ejido, Chilón municipality, resumes its legal struggle that it has maintained for over three years. On 27 May, they sought a meeting with the Council of the Federal Judiciary (CJF) and the office of the UN High Commissioner on Human Rights to demand the return of their lands, which had been “taken arbitrarily” by state and federal authorities on 2 February 2011. The judge “gave his consent for the installation of a single control-point at the entrance of the Agua Azul waterfalls,” recommending thus that the government administer it, though the document “did not have the signatures of ejidatarios, nor had it been previously announced,” said Ricardo Lagunes Gasca, juridical representative of the ejidatarios. In this way, the ejidatarios who adhere to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandona Jungle sent a petition to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) in Washington on the looting of their lands and the repression and criminalization suffered by their organization on the part of the state-government of Chiapas.
In other news, the Movement for Justice in the Barrio, the Group in Solidarity with Chiapas from Dorset, the Committee of True Word from Kolkata, India, and the Committee of the True Word of Alisal have organized a week of global action: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Struggle of Bachajón Continues!” for the days 25 June to 2 July. The organizational groups note that the initiative, “supported by the ejidatarios,” constitutes a response “to the brutal murder” of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, killed by gunfire on 24 April, former leader in San Sebastián Bachajón. The organizations stressed that “the Tseltal community continue to be attacked by the forces of capitalism and the transnational firms that will leave no corner of the world untouched.” Here “they desire the Agua Azul waterfalls, toward the end of converting it into a touristic destination for private luxury consumption,” they claim. “The ejidatarios, who inherited these lands and care for them, represent an obstacle,” and so have been made the object of “death-threats, aggressions, arbitrary arrests, disappearances, incarceration, torture, and attacks from governmental and paramilitary forces.”
*************************************************************************
Convocation for the Week of Worldwide Action:
“Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives!
The Bachajón struggle continues!”
From Tuesday, June 25 to Tuesday, July 2, 2013
To our sisters and brothers of the Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón:
To our Zapatista sisters and brothers:
To our compañer@s of the Sexta:
To the Committees of the True Word:
To the adherents to the International Campaign in Defense of El Barrio and our allies everywhere:
To civil society in Mexico and the world:
Movement for Justice in El Barrio, Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, the Committee of the True Word from Kolkata, India and the Committee of the True Word from Alisal propose that we carry out the Week of Worldwide Action: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!” from Tuesday, June 25th (the birthday of Juan Vázquez Guzmán) to Tuesday, July 2nd, 2013.
We send you all greetings and embraces of solidarity from New York, Dorset, Kolkata and Alisal.
We wish to share with you our humble proposal and hope that you will wish to join with us in solidarity from your own places and in your own ways to carry out the Week of Worldwide Action: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!”.
This initiative is supported by the adherents of the Sixth of San Sebastián Bachajón.
Compañeras and Compañeros:
In these times when the very survival of our Mother Earth is under threat from the forces of greed and profit which level the mountains, uproot the jungles and forests, dam the rivers and poison the waters, creating a wasteland of despair, we want to share with you the pain and indignation we feel following the savage murder of our beloved compañero, Juan Vázquez Guzmán from San Sebastián Bachajón, on April 24, 2013.
We demand justice! His killers must not remain unpunished! No more impunity!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán was the Secretary General of the adherents to the Sixth Declaration from the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón, and an inspiration to us all in his struggle against the brutal repression and plunder of the land and territory of the ejidatarios (communal landholders) of these communities.
In response to the tragic death of our beloved compañero, Juan Vazquez Guzman, we invite groups around the world to keep his memory alive. Those who knew Juan knew a man whose words had strength and whose vision and heart were free from fear in the struggle for the defense of his people and their land. His warm smile, his contagious sense of humor, his love for his people and his commitment to the creation of another world will stay in the hearts of those who had the good fortune to know him.
Juan’s dedication and passion remain with us, and we call on you to join us in remembering his life and continuing his struggle.
The indigenous Tzeltal communities of Bachajón are under attack from the forces of capitalism and transnational corporations who will leave no corner of the world untouched, and will not rest until they have destroyed the entire planet.
In San Sebastián Bachajón, their greed covets the ownership of the beautiful waterfalls of Agua Azul, in order to make them into a private luxury tourist destination. The ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón are obstacles to their plans and their profit, as this is land they inherited from their ancestors and care for as a treasure of humanity. This has made them recipients of threats, aggressions, arbitrary detentions, forced disappearances, imprisonment, torture, and attacks from state forces and paramilitary groups.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán was a leader of his people in their struggle to defend their land, their history, customs and traditions, their livelihood and means of sustenance, their rivers, jungles and wildlife, everything that makes life on earth precious.
Compañeras and Compañeros:
The bad governments and their allies in multinational business corporations wish to destroy the indigenous peoples and all those who struggle from below and to the left, because it is only the organized resistance of autonomous communities against the wars and destruction of our natural resources that can save the Mother Earth for our children.
For this reason, we call on you all to join together to continue the dignified struggle of compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán and the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, so that all ways and forms of life may have their place.
To all those who strive to build another, better, world, one of freedom, justice, democracy and dignity, we call on you all to join our forces together to organize actions –from your own area and according to your different methods of struggle- such as demonstrations, marches, street stalls, handing out flyers, public forums, theatre, informative gatherings, and any other activities to carry out the:
Week of Worldwide Action: “Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives! The Bachajón struggle continues!”
From Tuesday, June 25th to Tuesday, July 2nd of this year.
We ask you to please let us know as soon as possible if you are able to accept our proposal and if you will participate. You can contact us by email at:
laotrany@yahoo.com
To our beloved compa Juan Vázquez Guzmán, we embrace you, knowing that you will always be with us. We will always be thankful to you for having given so much inspiration to each of us in our own struggles.
The seed of resistance you nourished in these indigenous soils will continue to grow and flourish watered by the love and the passion for struggle you have given us.
You will never be alone.
We believe that everyone should know of your dignified life and of the dignified resistance of your people.
We demand a full investigation of your assassination, and punishment of those responsible.
Your voice will not be silenced, nor will the work of your heart be ended.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán, compañero, we will remember you on June 25th, the day of your birthday. We call on all people of good heart to celebrate your life and your dignified struggle.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán, beloved compa and brother, guardian of the land, the struggle continues.
Land, Freedom and Justice for the Ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón!
Freedom and Justice for Antonio Estrada Estrada, Miguel Vázquez Deara and Miguel Demeza Jiménez of San Sebastián Bachajón!
Stop the Aggressions against the Adherents to the Sexta!
Long Live the Zapatistas!
No more impunity!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán, Presente!
With embraces of Love and Solidarity,
Movement for Justice in El Barrio
Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group
Committee of the True Word from Kolkata, India
Committee of the True Word from Alisal
*************************************************************************
The Government is accused of Convoking False Assemblies in Bachajón
** Ejido owners denounce that the government aims to take their lands
** Murder and imprisonment are part of the plan; they say they will not permit abuses
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
The ejido owners of San Sebastián Bachajón (Chilón Municipality, Chiapas) have denounced that the government is falsely announcing community assemblies for renewing community authorities. These are “the tricks which the bad government, at its federal, state and municipal levels, is using to take from us once and for all our lands which belong to us as the indigenous peoples we are, we have been here since before the arrival of the invaders over 500 years ago”.
They add: “Those who want to take our land from us do not respect our people, they want to remove us through the use of bad deeds, tricks, corruption, assassinating our compañeros in the struggle, sending their police or taking our compañeros to prison, because that is how these criminals and repressors, Enrique Peña Nieto, Noé Castañón León (Chiapas Secretary of Government), Leonardo Guirao Aguilar (Mayor of Chilón) and the former [ejido] commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, govern”.
They say that this week the state’s press published “information from the same bad government,” announcing alleged assemblies in the ejido’s population centers (June 12 in Alan Sajcún, June13 in Chich and June 14 in Bachajón) for renewing community authorities in San Sebastián Bachajón, and that the outgoing commissioner, Francisco Guzmán Jiménez (alias Goyito) is accordingly doing the count in the presence of government authorities to witness”.
“That is a pure lie,” the Tzeltal ejido owners say. “No convocation exists in the communities and centers of our town; what the bad government put in the newspaper is no more than to make it appear that what it is doing is legal.” It acted in the same way with “its frauds” on April 18 in the election of ejido authorities, “inflating the list of ejido owners and buying votes”. Now, the indigenous accuse, the authorities “want to get signatures to throw out the injunction (amparo) case 274/2011 in the seventh district court, which a compañero from our organization presented in order to defend our territory. They want to make a fraudulent act of assembly and for this reason the bad government is financing the new fraud because it wants to finish us off and take away our lands illegally.”
They point out that: “as always,” the Agrarian Prosecutor in Ocosingo, the municipality of Chilón and different agencies of the Chiapas government, “do the dirty work to give support to these frauds and evil actions, because they are principal generators of the conflict in the communities; they always seek [what is in] their interest and to make more money; it’s not important if it is at the cost of life and suffering of the peoples.”
The indigenous warn: “We are letting the bad government know that the town of San Sebastián Bachajón continues resisting and that our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán (the leader assassinated a few weeks ago in his home) lives among us. We are not going to permit more abuse.”
They demand respect for their territory and the immediate freedom of three of their compañeros, “imprisoned and tortured:” Antonio Estrada Estrada (in the prison at Playas de Catazajá), Miguel Vázquez Deara (in Ocosingo) and Miguel Demeza Jiménez (in El Amate of Cintalapa de Figueroa).
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Saturday, June 8, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/06/08/politica/017n1pol
******************************************************************************
San Sebastián Bachajón, dispossession and violence from the Mexican State
~
Photo: José Aureliano BuendíaGiven the arbitrariness and violence from the Mexican government, representatives of the indigenous ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón – located in the centre of the jungle, in the Zapatista region of San José en Rebeldía – went on Monday May 28th, 2013, to Mexico City to demand the restitution of the communal territory, which two years ago was taken from them by the government of Juan Sabines Guerrero in the state of Chiapas.
At a press conference they pointed out the responsibility of Enrique Peña Nieto, Manuel Velasco Coello and Leonardo Guirao Aguilar as the drivers of a policy of dispossession and violence against those who oppose the eco-tourism projects in the Palenque – Agua Azul corridor.
Juan Vazquez Guzman, a state crime.
Mired in a web of corruption and abuse, the Mexican government directs all its efforts against the people, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, in Bachajón, in order to take away part of their territory and to promote a mega-tourist project in the region of Agua Azul.
After the murder of the activist Juan Vázquez Guzmán on 25th April 2013, the Tzeltal indigenous have repeatedly denounced that this represents a state crime. To date there is no progress in the investigation into the perpetrators of the crime; however, harassment and persecution are a constant in this region of the state.
Ricardo Lagunes Gasca, legal representative of the ejidatarios, says:
“Concerning Juan Vázquez Guzmán, there have been no arrests. The government is responsible, the government sent people to kill him. It was in the interests of the three levels of government that the compañero did not continue doing his job. There is an ongoing preliminary investigation, but there have been no arrests. The perpetrator escaped, it was planned. They were people who know the place, who had their escape route well-defined. He received six shots, one in the chest, three in the abdomen and two in both arms, they killed him in the doorway of his home.”
The reason for the murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán is his work in the defence of the common territory, which around 2000 ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Other Campaign, have undertaken since 2008, the date when a tollbooth was established in the territory of San Sebastián, to demand the legitimate use and enjoyment of their territory.
Sustainable tourism, the deception of development
Photo: José Aureliano BuendíaGiven the economic benefit which tourism brings to the region, businesses such as Norton Consulting Inc. and EDSA Construction have seen the benefits of the tourism development plans FONATUR has for the region, which are intended to transform the Biosphere Reserve of Agua Azul into an eco-tourist complex. The great fallacy of “development” which gave momentum to Juan Sabines (PRD) and the current governor Manuel Velasco Coello (Green Party) remains a strategy for the dispossession and displacement of indigenous communities in Chiapas.
For 20 years, the waterfalls of Agua Azul -indigenous territory- have been a source of financial speculation from major international hotel groups.
The Agua Azul development plans include golf courses and hotels for elite tourism and Boutique-type Hotels, where it is hoped to attract international tourists or those who are willing to pay between 4,000 and 10,000 pesos a night. -Carlos Slim could come to stay there- comment the ejidatarios with smiles, in fighting mood.
During the first days of February 2011, through a paramilitary operation, led by Juan Álvaro and Miguel Ruiz Hernández, leaders of the PRI and the Green Ecologist Party in the region, the tool booth of Agua Azul was evicted. In the days after 117 Indians were arrested, ten of whom were charged with crimes they did not commit, such as illegal imprisonment, injuries, homicide and damage to roads and to the peace. This was noted by the Centre for Women’s Rights in Chiapas, the Independent Women’s Movement, the Feminist Brigade and various civil society organizations [i] during a caravan in February 2011.
Photo: José Aureliano BuendíaWith this act of violence a piece of land, 2,250 square metres in size, was taken from them, which curiously is next to the Agua Azul tollbooth. Given this arbitrary action, the ejidatarios made public the plans that were made for the ejido in a presidential decree issued in 1980. Because, treacherously, CONANP (the National Commission for Natural Protected Areas), had literally erased from the map the piece of land that is part of the ejido of San Sebastián.
CONANP declared this piece of land as a protected area, it is also a strategic area for the Palenque – San Cristobal corridor.
“The booth is not within the protected natural area of the Agua Azul waterfalls. What CONANP did was alter the plan, so that the booth would stay within the protected area. Given this, the state says that the area is in federal territory,” says Ricardo Lagunes.
The paramilitary threat
The ejidatarios also pointed out that an international airport is currently being built in Palenque –by the company GMD infrastructure- to reduce the time of the journey to the waterfalls of Agua Azul. The San Cristobal-Palenque highway is a project that is on hold, but which surely will get going soon, now the lines are constantly changing because the government has to calculate which territories will present least resistance.
Agua Azul was a ranch, where there was even a helipad. After the Zapatista uprising in 1994, the communities took the land, but it remained private property. The Tzeltal indigenous who are in Agua Azul come from San Sebastián, the indigenous from Bachajón took that land and are still there. However they have no land titles, the government keeps it this way, because it makes them more amenable to agreeing to projects.
Ricardo tells us that there are groups in Agua Azul who have confronted other communities, not only their compañeros in San Sebastián Bachajón, but also communities with Zapatista support bases. They have on more than two occasions made an armed attack on communities with the aim of threatening and displacing them from areas where projects are planned.
On repeated occasions, the communities have denounced the threat from paramilitary groups linked to the PRI, PRD and PVEM political parties. Among those are the Union of Indigenous and Forest Campesinos (UCIAF) led by Manuel Vázquez Ruiz and the Organization for the Defence of Indigenous and Campesino Rights (OPDDIC), both being of paramilitary appearance and having already attacked the ejidatarios of San Sebastian Bachajón.
A few days after the murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, Jorge Luis Llaven Abarca, Secretary of Security and Civil Protection for the State of Chiapas, announced the training that the Ministry of Defence of Israel in Mexico would be providing for local police [ii]. The crimes against humanity committed against the Palestinian people by the Military State of Israel [iii] appear to be part of the security model which the governor- soap opera- Manuel Velasco Coello has in mind for the state of Chiapas.
We will not be silent as the bad government wants
In addition to the press conference held in the offices of UNIOS, an organisation adherent to the Other Campaign, the objective of the representatives of the community of San Sebastián Bachajón was to deliver a further letter to Juan Silva Meza, President Minister of the Council of the Federal Judiciary, requesting it to act impartially in the resolution of the petition for amparo [order for legal protection] made by the ejidatarios in 2011. Their agenda also included a visit to the office of the UN High Commissioner to denounce the many irregularities the Mexican government has committed against them.
The struggle of the community of San Sebastián Bachajón in respect of their territory also seeks the immediate release of Antonio Estrada Estrada (prisoner in CERSS 17, in Playas de Catazajá, Chiapas), Miguel Vázquez Deara (imprisoned in CERSS 16, in Ocosingo, Chiapas) and Miguel Demeza Jiménez (imprisoned in CERSS 14, El Amate). They were arrested in 2010 – 2011 and tortured to make them plead guilty to crimes they did not commit, and to add one more to the aggravations committed by the Mexican State against indigenous communities.
Convened by the Movement for Justice in El Barrio (New York), the Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, the Committee of the True Word from Calcutta, India and the Committee of the True Word from Alisal, a week of worldwide action is being prepared called: Juan Vázquez Guzmán Lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
From 25 June to 2 July, 2013, the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón invites us to join the struggle for respect for indigenous territories, to be part of their dignified rage.
Their words: “We will not permit the continued dispossession of our lands and abuse against our people, despite the cowardly murder of our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán, we will keep fighting and defending with strength and organization, we will not be silent as the bad government wants. Juan Vazquez Guzman lives, the Bachajón struggle continues! ”
By José Aureliano Buendía, 6th June, 2013
http://subversiones.org/archivos/789
[i] Chiapas: Caravan of women to San Sebastián Bachajón. http://sipaz.wordpress.com/2011/02/22/chiapas-caravana-de-mujeres-a-san-sebastian-bachajon/
[ii] Israeli Ministry of Defense will train police in Chiapas. Milenio 29th May, 2013http://www.milenio.com/cdb/doc/noticias2011/bc01560894ebeaca05b7a5f0de164960
[iii] “The Commission on Human Rights of the United Nations today approved a resolution denouncing the “ongoing and serious” violations of fundamental rights in the occupied Palestinian territories and demanded that Israel respect humanitarian principles of international law.” Comisión de Derechos Humanos condena a Israel por violación de derechos fundamentales, UN News Centre, 24th March 2004. http://www.un.org/spanish/News/story.asp?NewsID=2066#.UaceKdjleSo
***********************************************************************
COMMUNIQUE
FROM THE ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE, EJIDO SAN SEBASTIÁN BACHAJÓN, CHIAPAS, MEXICO,
JUNE 6, 2013
To the people of Mexico and the world
To the compañer@s adherents to the sixth national and international
To the mass and alternative media
To national and international human rights defenders
To the Good Government Juntas
To the peoples in resistance
To movement for justice in el barrio
To the committees of the true word
To public opinion
From the northern zone of Chiapas we send our greetings, with respect and love, to all the peoples of Mexico and the world who are struggling and building alternatives for a different way of life to this system of the bad neoliberal government, which is one of death and capitalist exploitation which humiliates us and wants to put an end to our hopes.
It is important that the compañer@s from around the world, who are watching what happens in our community of San Sebastián Bachajón, know the tricks which the bad government, at its federal, state and municipal levels, is using to take from us once and for all our lands that belong to us as the indigenous peoples we are, we have been here since before the arrival of the invaders over 500 years ago. Those who want to take our land from us do not respect our people, they want to remove us through the use of bad deeds, tricks, corruption, assassinating our compañeros in the struggle, ordering their police or sending our compañeros to prison, because that is how these criminals and repressors, Enrique Peña Nieto, Noé Castañón Leon, Leonardo Guirao Aguilar and the former commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, govern.
We denounce that on Tuesday the 4th of June, information was published from the same bad government in the newspaper cuarto poder from tuxtla, saying that assemblies will be held on 12th June in Alan Sajcun, 13th June in Chich, and 14th June in Bachajon, for renewing the community authorities in San Sebastián Bachajón, and that the outgoing commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez (also known as the Goyito) is going to do the accounts in the presence of government officials to bear witness, but this is a pure lie because there is no convocation for these [assemblies] in the communities and the centers of our people, the bad government has just put it in the newspaper to make it look as if what they are doing is legal.
Just as they perpetrated frauds in the election of the ejidal authorities on April 18th by inflating the list of ejidatarios and buying votes, now they want to get signatures to throw out from the seventh district court the amparo, no 274/2011, which a compañero of our organization presented to defend our territory; they want to make a fraudulent act of assembly and for this reason the bad government is funding this fraud because they want to finish us off altogether and take our land illegally. The agrarian prosecutor from Ocosingo, the municipality of Chilón and the different levels of government of the state of Chiapas are, as always, doing the dirty work to give support to these frauds and misdeeds, because they are the main sources of conflict in the communities, they always look to their own interests and to make more money and do not care if it is at the cost of the suffering and the life of the people.
We are letting the bad government know that the people of San Sebastián Bachajón continue in resistance and our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives among us watching over his people from above. We will not allow more abuses to take place, we demand respect for our territory and the immediate release of our imprisoned and tortured compañeros Antonio Estrada Estrada in Playas de Catazajá, Miguel Vázquez Deara in Ocosingo and Miguel Demeza Jimenez in el Amate.
We send our solidarity and respect to the communities, indigenous peoples and resistance movements in Mexico and the world, and encourage our compañeros because the struggle continues.
We demand the immediate release of compañeros Alberto Patishtan and Rosario Díaz Méndez from the voice of el Amate and the compañeros in solidarity. Freedom for all political prisoners in the country and the world, bring down the prison walls!
Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
We, men and women from the north of Chiapas, Mexico, send you a combative embrace.
Respectfully
Land and Freedom!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
*******************************************************************************
The assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán in Chiapas, Mexico
“He gave his life for the land”
Article published in Peace News, June 2013
On 24 April, 2013, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, indigenous Tzeltal, aged only 32, father of two small children aged four and seven, human rights defender and much-loved community leader, was gunned down in the doorway of his home. The territory and community for which Juan gave his life was the communal landholding (ejido) of San Sebastián Bachajón, in the jungle region of the state of Chiapas in South-East Mexico.
Juan had worked tirelessly with his indigenous brothers and sisters since 2006 to defend the ancestral land and territory of his people from the interests of the government and transnational corporations who wished to dispossess them for a luxury “eco-tourism” development. On April 18, 2010, he was made Secretary General of the three centres of the ejido, and his dedicated work continued until the day of his death. His community members are left devastated, and his assassins escaped into the impunity which reigns in his country.
The ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón has become a conflict point because its lands adjoin the stunningly beautiful waterfalls of Agua Azul, identified by the Mexican government and transnational business as the focal point of a new luxury tourist development for upmarket ‘light adventure’ tourism. Unfortunately for the people who have lived on this land for centuries, who have been the traditional guardians of the Mother Earth and its resources, for whom territory is the basis of a dignified life, they are now the only obstacle to what could become “one of the most special experiences in the Western hemisphere”.
The communal landholders (ejidatarios) of Bachajón have thus become the recipients of daily threats, aggressions, arbitrary detentions, forced disappearances, imprisonment, extensive use of torture, and attacks from paramilitary groups. The strategy of the three levels of government, local, state, and federal, has been to develop alliances with, and give support to, local political party members and to criminalise those who resist, with the aim of generating conflict among the communities in the area.
The focus of conflict has, over the last few years, been the booth where tourists buy tickets to visit the waterfalls. In 2008, the ejidatarios decided to become supporters of the Zapatistas’ Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle. As part of this process, to exert their acknowledged right as original peoples to free determination over the territory in which they live, their land and its resources, the ejidatarios took control of this booth.
Since this time, the booth has been taken and reclaimed many times, in huge military and police operations. In February 2011, 117 people were arrested, leading to a five months long international campaign, led by the New York-based Movement for Justice in El Barrio, to free the Bachajón 5, the last of these political prisoners to be released. As always, Juan Vázquez Guzmán was extremely active throughout, supporting the prisoners, promoting legal initiatives to establish the right to the land and territory, speaking at public forums, making links with other organizations to spread awareness of the struggle, always with passion, enthusiasm, commitment, love and hope.
Juan’s neighbours tell of how he loved to go to the river with them to fish. He also liked banda and ranchera music. “Juan was seen as one of the leaders who gave their lives for their people and for the defence of the land; he was a person who was committed to what he believed in and raised the voice and the agreements of the authorities everywhere. He liked to travel and to meet other compas, to see their struggles and share their experiences.”
According to Mexican newspaper La Jornada “a cascade” of pronouncements from communities and organisations followed Juan’s death. “Juan Vázquez,” wrote the local Human Rights Centre, “is part of the historic struggle for the construction of alternative ways of life,” expressing its outrage at his killing, and demanding justice.
His community members declared: “We demand that this murder does not remain unpunished. We, the men women and children, ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, make a call for solidarity to achieve justice. Following the death of our compañero, our struggle is not diminished; we will continue moving forward towards our goal, because we know that his death was for the defence of our Mother Earth, because the mountains and springs are the lords of those who care for them”. They later added: “We are here and we are not going to leave, because even though they kill us and want to destroy us as indigenous peoples, the heart of the people is alive and will continue struggling whatever the cost”.
*****************************************************************************
“We remain strong” against the tourism project: Bachajón ejidatarios
Clayton Conn, June 3, 2013
Dispossessed of part of their territory by the Chiapas government, and with one of their most respected members killed with impunity a month ago, the ejidatarios (common landholders) of San Sebastián Bachajón make clear that they will continue to defend their land against the tourist project planned for the waterfalls of Agua Azul.
The struggle, however, has been at a high cost. “The government ordered the killing” of the Tzeltal ejidatario Juan Vázquez Guzmán, accuses Ricardo Lagunes, the legal representative of the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón, located in the municipality of Chilón. Lagunes warns that the dispossession of the land of the ejido “is only the beginning; it is not just 2,590 square metres that the government wants, this is just the start of the plunder that is to come”.
Lagunes and the Tzeltal ejidatarios Mariano Moreno Guzmán and Domingo Pérez Álvaro, said that the inhabitants of Bachajón are outraged by the violent repression from the government and its relentless efforts to strip them of their land.
The disputed territory includes the site of the popular (and profitable) tourist destination of the Waterfalls of Agua Azul, and is witness to a long history of bloodshed and “legal” intervention from the authorities, with the intention of preventing the Tzeltals from exercising their right to self-determination, and opening up the land for private development. The latest round of violence and judicial blows began in April 2013, and continued until the assassination with six bullets in the chest -on the night of April 24-, of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, passionate ejidal authority[i], a man respected by his community and an indigenous rights defender.
“It is a tragedy that they killed him in a cowardly way, it is wicked that they did not show their faces”, says Perez. Vázquez Guzmán worked tirelessly for the organization of his community and of social movements throughout Mexico. An adherent to the Other Campaign (La Sexta), Guzmán was appointed secretary general of the three centres of the ejido in 2010. In 2011 he was arrested without a legal warrant by state and judicial police, who argued that he was leading the resistance to the project, referring to the opposition of the inhabitants of Bachajón to the privatization of the area to expand tourism around the waterfalls.
More than a month after his murder, there is no indication that there is an effective investigation in place to find those responsible. The ejidatarios accuse the government of political murder, because of Guzmán’s active participation: “The one responsible, we have said from the beginning, is the government which had him killed,” Lagunes accuses.
Since 2007, the ejidatarios have suffered differing levels of violence and repression from the authorities and from paramilitary organizations supporting the PRI, used as a means of breaking up the community and its resistance. In 2009, eight ejidatarios and adherents to the Other Campaign were arrested by state and federal police. That same year, Ricardo Lagunes was arrested and beaten at a PRI paramilitary checkpoint when he left a meeting in Bachajón. In 2011, 117 ejidatarios were arbitrarily detained by police when they tried to evict them from the toll booth at the entrance to the Agua Azul area. Ten, including Pérez Álvaro, remained political prisoners for an extended period of time.
The violence and repression are joined by legal and judicial decisions denying the rights of the ejidatarios. The 2011 arrest and the eviction of the ejidatarios allowed the authorities to take control of collectively owned lands, where they want to build a tourist destination to rival sites like Cancun.
As a way to legally prove who has the rights to the land, the ejidatarios of Bachajón, presented amparo 274/2011 against the dispossession. Mariano Moreno Guzmán, one of the founders of the ejido, was assigned to present the petition for amparo, which was denied on January 30, 2013 by the Seventh District Judge from Tuxtla Gutiérrez, José del Carmen Constantine. However, on 16 May, the Third Collegiate Court from Tuxtla threw out the order from the Seventh as illegal and ordered the reinstatement of the procedure.
The ejidatarios are not convinced that the state will act in their interests. They identify the president, Enrique Peña Nieto, the governor of Chiapas, Manuel Velasco Coello, and the mayor of Chilón, Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, as those responsible for the dispossession, for the benefit of corporations. “They do not let us go to our land, they say it all belongs to them, but we have a plan to show that it is our land. We have to fight and take it back”, cried the ejidatario Moreno Guzman.
The Tzeltal of Bachajón have suffered persistent repression from the judicial authorities, -who in theory should be defending them-, but they insist that they remain steadfast in their struggle for justice. “Even though they killed our compañero, it does not stop us from walking, we will go forward and be strong,” said Perez.
Several Mexican and international social organizations (such as Movement for Justice in El Barrio, the Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, the Committee of the True Word from Calcutta and the Committee of the True Word from Alisal) announced the launch of the “Week of Worldwide Action: Juan Vazquez Guzman Lives!, The Bachajón struggle continues!” This worldwide action will run from June 25th (the birthday of Vázquez Guzmán) to July 2, 2013.
[i] Person in a position of responsibility in the community
**************************************************************************
Juan Vázquez Guzmán
Gloria Muñoz Ramírez, Los de Abajo, 1st June 2013
A month after the murder of Juan Vázquez Guzmán , Tzeltal ejidatario[1] and defender of the land in Chiapas, the case remains unpunished. His death, his compañeros from the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón repeat, is the responsibility of the bad governments who in cowardly fashion order assassination. The pro-Zapatista Bachajón ejidatarios keep his memory in defending their territory, since, as Ricardo Lagunes, lawyer from the Fray Bartolome de las Casas Human Rights Centre (Frayba)[2] and legal representative of the ejido, which is situated in the official municipality of Chilón, emphasised, since 2007 they have suffered violence and repression from the authorities or paramilitary organizations from the PRI political party, which are used to break up the community and its resistance. He also recalled that in 2011, 117 ejidatarios were arbitrarily detained by the police when they tried to evict them from their toll booth at the entrance to the Agua Azul area.
The aim of the harassment is to displace them from an ejido in the highly desirable tourist destination known as the Agua Azul waterfalls. They say their projects are to provide work for the indigenous and help them out of poverty, but all they want is to keep our land and return us to the time of slavery, the Tzeltal campesinos warned this week. It is no coincidence that the violence and repression are linked to legal decisions which deny the rights of the ejidatarios. The arrest and subsequent eviction of 2011 allowed the authorities to take control of collectively owned land, where they want to build a tourist destination to rival locations like Cancun.
The dispossession of land from the ejido has scarcely begun. It is not only the 2,590 square meters that the government wants: this is the beginning of the looting that will come later, says Ricardo Lagunes. The project is large and far-reaching, as the lands been considered for decades to be an object of financial speculation for tourism, because they are at the centre of the eight tourist circuits that form one of the three strategic corridors of the Mesoamerica Project. On May 28, a delegation from San Sebastian Bachajón went to Mexico City to reinforce their message and denounce the strategy of division promoted by the government: They said that the bad government buys ejidal and community authorities who have no conscience to defend their people, who sell themselves for a few pesos and become faithful servants of the bad government, because they only care about their own personal interests.
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/06/01/opinion/010o1pol
[1] Communal landholder. An ejido is a communal landholding.
[2] Ricardo Lagunes does not, in fact, work for Frayba, but for Asesoria y Defensa Legal del Sureste.
******************************************************************************
Communiqué from San Sebastián Bachajón, 28th of May, 2013
To the people of Mexico and the world
To the compañer@s adherents to the sixth declaration of the Lacandon Jungle
To the mass and alternative media
To national and international human rights defenders
To the Good Government Juntas
To the indigenous peoples in resistance
To public opinion
We come with dignified rage to give our word in Mexico City, we want to denounce once again the great injustices and dispossessions that the three levels of bad government, headed by the major criminals Enrique Peña Nieto, Manuel Velasco Coello and Leonardo Guirao Aguilar, continue to commit against our people. These corrupt governments displace indigenous peoples from their territory to develop transnational projects and make themselves rich at the expense of our suffering. They say that their projects are to provide work for the indigenous so they can get out of poverty, but the only thing they want is to keep our lands and for us to return to the time of slavery. It is these same corrupt governments who sent people to cowardly assassinate our compañero in the struggle, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, during the evening of April 24, 2013, while he was resting at his home in the settlement of Bachajón.
The bad government buys ejidal[i] and community authorities[ii] who have no conscience to defend their people, they sell themselves for a few pesos and become faithful servants of the bad government, because they only see their personal interests. An authority who governs without obeying and defending his people is not really an authority, but simply has the name, so the people have the right to defend themselves. In our community the officialist[iii] ejidal authorities are manipulated by the government to consummate the theft of our lands. The former commissioners Pedro Alvaro Hernández and Francisco Guzmán Jiménez now have good cars and live off the fat of the land because they no longer work the fields. They have allowed the government to militarize and fill our communities with state preventive police. They signed documents handing over our land to the government, without the authorisation of our highest authority the General Assembly, and instead of being punished and sent to prison, they are rewarded and protected by the bad government. But the indigenous who fight for their people are tortured and punished in jail, serving unjust sentences, like our prisoners Antonio Estrada Estrada (prisoner in CERSS 17, Playas de Catazajá, Chiapas), Miguel Vázquez Deara (prisoner in CERSS 16, Ocosingo, Chiapas) and Miguel Demeza Jiménez (prisoner in CERSS 14, El Amate).
The theft of our lands has been prepared, since the end of 2010, by the general secretary of government Noé Castañón León himself, at his offices in Tuxtla Gutierrez, together with the former ejidal commissioners Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, Carmen Aguilar Gómez Primero, Juan Alvaro Moreno, Manuel Jiménez Moreno and Miguel Ruiz Hernández. On February 2, 2011, they came to violently evict the compañeros of our organization from the toll booth[iv] we built with much effort to benefit the people, they stole building materials and cash, and the next day they arrested 117 of our compañeros.
The bad government has strongly repressed our movement because they want us to disappear, they do not like the people to organize and defend what is theirs, they just want to get rid of us and for nobody to say anything. These same bad governments say we live in a democracy, but they repress us with state forces and order assassination to silence our movement which fights for justice, land, freedom and democracy.
On March 2, 2011 compañero Mariano Moreno Guzmán, who is one of the founders of the ejido and a former ejidal commissioner who obtained the documents for our people, presented an amparo[v] on account of the eviction. The amparo was allotted to the Seventh District Judge in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas with the number 274/2011. On January 30, 2013, the corrupt Judge José del Carmen Constantino Avendaño gave judgement and dismissed the amparo. On May 16, 2013, the Third Collegiate Court of Tuxtla rejected the judgment of the Seventh Court as being illegal and ordered the reinstatement of the procedure. Now the Seventh Judge must notify the claim for amparo to the General Assembly of Ejidatarios through the officialist Ejidal Commissioner, who is from the government. The skill of the government can be clearly seen, as they could not cancel the amparo with the judgment of Judge Constantino Avendaño, they now want to use an Act of Assembly, similar to those they like to fabricate with the complicity of the Chief Resident of the Agrarian Prosecutor of Ocosingo, Engineer Luis Demetrio Domínguez López, the Municipal Presidency of Chilón and the government authorities of Chiapas.
We will not allow the theft of our lands and the abuse of our people to continue, despite the cowardly assassination of our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán, we will keep fighting and defending with energy and organization, we will not be silent as the bad government wants us to be. Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues!
We join the week of worldwide action: Juan Vázquez Guzmán lives, the Bachajón struggle continues! convoked by our compañeros from Movement for Justice in El Barrio, Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group, Committee of the True Word from Kolkata, India and Committee of the True Word from Alisal, for the days from June 25th to July 2nd.
From the northern zone of Chiapas, receive an embrace from the women and men of San Sebastián Bachajón. May 28, 2013.
Respectfully
Land and Freedom!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
[i] From ejido, a communal landholding
[ii] Authorities are people with positions of responsibility in the community
[iii] Officialist here means government-supporting
[iv] Toll booth is where tickets are sold to visitors to the waterfalls of Agua Azul
[v] Amparo is a form of legal protection
******************************************************************************
San Sebastián Bachajón Ejido Owners Renew the Legal Struggle in Defense of Their Territory
** They have been to the Federal Judiciary Council and a UN agency
By: Hermann Bellinghausen, 28th May 2013
This week, the Chiapas ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón, municipality of Chilón, resumes the legal battle that it has been maintaining for more than three years in defense of its territory and the right to community self-determination. This Monday, representatives of the Tzeltal community went to the Federal Judiciary Council (CJF, its initials in Spanish) and the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, to demand the return of an area of their territory, which various Chiapas and federal authorities “arbitrarily took possession” of on February 2, 2011.
“We presented a new letter to the president of the CJF, Juan Silva Meza, so that it [the CJF] can ensure impartiality and independence in the resolution of the protective order (amparo) filed in 2011,” reported Ricardo Lagunes Gasca, legal representative of the ejido owners, who is accompanying the indigenous delegates in this process. On January 30 of this year, the seventh judge of Tuxtla Gutiérrez issued a decision dismissing the amparo, considering that the ejido member authorized by the community, Mariano Moreno Guzmán, “did not have the requirements of the Law of Amparo for being the ejido’s surrogate representative.” Furthermore, they demanded that they [the CJF] take in to account the apocryphal nature of the act of assembly which was presented, in order to get amparo themselves, by the Secretary General of the Chiapas Government and the ejidal commissioner in his service, Francisco Guzmán Jiménez.
Apocryphal act
The judge validated it [the act of assembly] and determined that the ejido “gave its consent for the installation of the only ticket booth at the access to the Agua Azul Waterfalls”, thereby endorsing that the government would administer it, even when the document “does not have signatures of the ejido owners nor prior notice”.
The ejido owners and adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle promoted appeal number 118/2013 against the verdict, which was decided on May 16. The resolution of a tribunal in Chiapas, published on May 22, revokes the January 30 decision “because it considers it illegal” and orders the procedure to be reset so that the general assembly can be notified of the demand filed by Moreno Guzmán, “which should have been done on its admission on March 4, 2011, and not two years later.”
The indigenous, their lawyer stated, told Minister Silva Meza that they hope that the case “will be resolved according to the rights of indigenous peoples and the June 10, 2011 reforms; that it will guarantee that the judge does not determine the issue solely from the perspective of the agrarian law (more restrictive and less protective than international standards) and that it will guarantee the highest standards of protection for the rights of the peoples with respect to territory, the right to consultation and free, prior and informed consent.”
Accordingly, the autonomous authorities who are adherents to the Sixth sent a petition to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in Washington, in relation to the dispossession of their territory, and the repression and criminalization of their organization by the Chiapas government.
Meanwhile, Movement for Justice in El Barrio from New York, the Dorset Chiapas Solidarity Group and the Committees of the True Word from Alisal and Kolkata, convoked the Week of Worldwide Action in support of this struggle, from June 25 to July 2. They pointed out that the initiative, “supported by the ejido owners”, is in response to the “savage assassination” of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, leader of the Sixth in San Sebastián Bachajón, on April 24. They emphasized that: “the Tzeltal communities are under attack from the forces of capitalism and transnational corporations who will leave no corner of the world untouched”.
Here “their greed covets the ownership of the beautiful waterfalls of Agua Azul, in order to make them into a private luxury tourist destination”, they asserted. “The ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón are obstacles”, which has made them the “recipients of threats, aggressions, arbitrary detentions, forced disappearances, imprisonment, torture, and attacks from state forces and paramilitary groups”.
———————————————————-
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Tuesday, May 28, 2013
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/05/28/politica/013n1pol
******************************************************************************
Communique from the Ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas Mexico
May 6, 2013
We are here and we are not going to leave, because even though they kill us and want to destroy us as indigenous peoples, the heart of the people is alive and will continue struggling whatever the cost
Enrique Peña Nieto, Manuel Velasco Suarez, Leonardo Guirao Aguilar and Francisco Guzmán Jiménez are those responsible for the violence and the dispossession of our lands and for the cowardly murder of our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán
FROM THE EJIDO SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDÓN JUNGLE, CHIAPAS, MEXICO, 6 MAY 2013
To the people of Mexico and the world
To the compañeros adherents to the sexta national and international
To the mass and alternative media
To national and international human rights defenders
To the Good Government Juntas
To public opinion
From the northern zone of Chiapas we greet all the compañeros and compañeras from organizations and groups who have sent messages of solidarity and love for our compa Juan Vázquez Guzmán, and for our resistance which continues in the struggle to defend what is ours and to tell the bad government that we are here and we are not going to leave, because even though they kill us and want to destroy us as indigenous peoples, the heart of the people is alive and will continue struggling whatever the cost.
The bad government wants to fill our lands with death and fear, so we get tired and no longer continue to defend our life, the people, our mother earth. Our struggle is for the life and dignity of our families and communities, we struggle for a world where many worlds fit, not for capitalism and money to be imposed on our land. The bad government wants us to disappear because we are in the way of its capitalist projects, and to give our land to transnational corporations so they can exploit our mother earth, the wind, the water, our seeds. The government is unable to do its job, it is a vile servant of those who truly have the power and money in the country, which is why they privatize education, electricity, Petróleos Mexicanos, and the land of indigenous peoples and campesinos with their structural reforms and their tax on food and medicines. The bad government for a long time now has not represented the people, but only their own interests, which means the people have to wake up and rise up to defend their rights which are being trampled on with total impunity.
Enrique Peña Nieto, Manuel Velasco Suarez, Leonardo Guirao Aguilar and Francisco Guzmán Jiménez are those responsible for the violence and the dispossession of our lands and for the cowardly murder of our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán, they are mainly interested in silencing the voice of our organization, and keeping our compañeros Antonio Estrada Estrada, Miguel Vázquez Deara and Miguel Demeza Jiménez hostages without a crime in their prisons of death.
These people of bad politics say that they are authorities, but they are really criminals who sell our lands and the fate of our country, who award themselves the life of the rich at the expense of an increasingly marginalized and excluded population, without work or a dignified wage, and without access to health and education. Their famous crusades against hunger only serve to do business with companies like Nestle and Pepsi, they say they want to fight hunger in the community, but for us it is a lie because we know that all they want is to keep the people poor to take advantage of their need and buy their votes at the next election.
We know that we are not alone in our struggle, because there are many people who have opened their eyes and know the tricks of the bad government, and these people also are fighting to continue being who they are. We wish to greet and offer solidarity to the compañeros of the Ch’ol people of the ejido Tila, who have spent many years resisting like us. We greet the Community Police of Guerrero, and the Zapotec and Ikoots peoples of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, the teachers who defend free public education, students, housewives, migrants, and dignified women, children and men who know they want to transform this country, which has been hijacked by a group of criminals called the political class and their bosses the lords of money.
We ask you to remain alert to events which may take place in our community, and we will keep you informed about our actions in defence of our territory.
Have courage, compañeros and compañeras.
Long live our political prisoners, we will continue to make demands until all of them have their freedom, because our word is stronger than the walls of the prison, together we will break down barriers; health and greetings to them.
Our combative embrace from men and women
From the northern zone of Chiapas, Mexico
Adherents to the sixth declaration of the Lacandón Jungle
Respectfully
Land and Freedom!
Hasta la victoria siempre!
********************************************************************************
From New York: On our beloved compa Juan Vázquez Guzmán
In the community of El Barrio, New York, we are full of sorrow and pain following the murder of our beloved compa Juan Vázquez Guzmán, adherent to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, from San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas.
Here in El Barrio, the memory of Juan Vázquez Guzmán will always be with us. His commitment to the struggle, his big smile, his love for his people and his dedication to creating another world will remain in our hearts and will continue to give us inspiration to keep on fighting.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán, dear brother, the simple and humble people of the Movement for Justice in El Barrio embrace you on your return to Mother Earth.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán, we will always appreciate you for giving us so much inspiration in our daily struggle.
Juan Vázquez Guzmán, here in El Barrio, you will always be with us.
Farewell dear brother.
Hasta siempre querido hermano.
Movement for Justice in El Barrio
****************************************************************************
Frayba Denounces the Increase in Aggressions and Threats against Activists in Chiapas
** Projects that violate the collective rights of the indigenous peoples are ongoing
** Frayba demands the prompt clarification of the assassination of the community leader Juan Vázquez Guzmán
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas, 2nd May, 2013
The Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Human Rights Centre (Frayba) denounced the increase in aggressions and threats against human rights defenders in Chiapas, as confirmed by the assassination last week of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, leader of the ejidatarios of the Sixth in San Sebastián Bachajón and defender of indigenous rights and political prisoners.
His assassination “goes beyond the limits of the marked repression that people who defend human rights at the community level, adherents to the Sixth, have confronted,” after the increase in violence against them for “insisting on processes of autonomy and defence of their territory,” Frayba maintained.
“The criminal act happened in the days before a regional meeting of authorities and adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle of San Sebastián Bachajón for defining actions of resistance and for the liberation of their political prisoners” (they have three, in three different state prisons).
The young Tzeltal leader “was outstanding in defence of territory in the Agua Azul region and denounced the dispossession that the Integrally Planned Centre Project (Proyecto Centro Integralmente Planeado, CIP-Palenque), part of the Mesoamerican Plan (previously the Plan Puebla-Panamá), wanted to implement.”
The conflict and violence in San Sebastián and the Jungle Region “has increased, provoked by actors from the different levels of government”, as Frayba already documented. Since 2006, “arbitrary deprivations of freedom, torture, harassment, threats, forced displacement, and the disproportionate or undue use of public force have occurred”. All of this through “incursions of the Public Security, the Police and the federal Army,” as well as “unilateral agreements of officials and political operators, repositioning of local political bosses with the parties in power, polarization, empowerment and impunity guaranteed to the shock groups in the region.”
The investors, backed up by the government, “insist on implementing projects that constitute territorial dispossession and which violate collective rights of indigenous peoples, recognized in Convention 169 of the ILO and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples”.
Nevertheless, indicates Frayba, which has followed closely the San Sebastián process, this determines how the original peoples of Chiapas “organize themselves and vindicate their territorial rights, as Juan Vázquez did, who now is part of the historic struggle in the construction of alternatives for the exercise of the right to choose ways of life consistent with living well (a dignified life).”
They had already incarcerated him on December 24, 2011 when, after holding him disappeared for a couple of hours, the Chilón municipal police took him to the State Center for the Social Re-insertion of those Sentenced (CERSS, its initials in Spanish) in Ocosingo, “seeking to impute the false crime of homicide to him, which they were not able to sustain, and hours later set him free.”
Last April 17, the ejido owners of the Sixth in San Sebastián denounced “new threats and the current state government’s politics of continuity.” In response to this, Frayba today demanded: “a prompt and expedited investigation to find the whereabouts and determine the punishment of the murderer of Juan Vázquez, a community leader and human rights defender”, who “gave his life for the defense of territory”.
———————————————————-
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Friday, May 3, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/05/03/politica/026n1pol
*************************************************************************
Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Human Rights Centre
San Cristobal de Las Casas, Chiapas, Mexico
May 2, 2013
Press Release No. 11
Heightening of the risk to Human Rights Defenders in Chiapas
The recent assassination of community defender Juan Vázquez confirms the increase in violent acts directed towards people who defend human rights in Chiapas
This Centre for Human Rights expresses its profound indignation at the violent assassination [1] of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, General Secretary of the Other Campaign of the Adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle of the EZLN (hereafter Adherents to the Sixth); a criminal act which happened in the days before a regional meeting of the authorities, Adherents of the Sixth, of the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón (SSB), to determine actions in defence of their territory and for the release of their political prisoners.
Juan Vázquez was known for inspiring and promoting the defence of territory in the Agua Azul region, he openly denounced the dispossession planned to take place through the project for the Integrally Planned Centre (CIP) of Palenque [2], part of the Plan Mesoamerica (formerly Plan Puebla Panama). In this context, while performing tasks on behalf of the Commission for the Defence of the Land and Territory, he was killed (on April 24, 2013) just outside his own house in the community of Bachajón, municipality of Chilón, Chiapas.
This action went beyond the limits of the marked repression faced by those people who are human rights defenders at the community level, Adherents to the Sixth, after suffering increasing violence for insisting on building processes of autonomy and defending their territory.
The increasing conflict and generalized violence, provoked by actors from the different levels of government in the San Sebastian Bachajón and Jungle (Selva) regions, has been documented by this Human Rights Centre; from 2006 until the present, various acts have been committed which constitute human rights violations, such as the arbitrary deprivation of liberty, torture, harassment, threats, forced displacement and disproportionate or undue use of government forces; all of these operated through incursions from the Public Security forces, the Police and the federal Army; unilateral agreements of officials and political operators; repositioning of local political bosses with the parties in power at the state and federal level; polarization, and the guarantee of empowerment and impunity to shock groups in the region.
Some relevant events in the memory of the people, and documented by this Centre, are listed below:
- April 2009: mass arrest for the defence of the territory, when 8 Adherents to the Sixth and a Support Base of the Zapatista National Liberation Army were taken prisoner; the Mexican government ordered a joint operation between the State Preventive Police (PEP) and the Federal Police (PF); while the campesinos were withdrawing, the police entered the ejidal lands and accused the detainees of various crimes, including committing robberies on the highway.
- February 2, 2011: Adherents to the Sixth were beaten and robbed by a group of “officialists” (supporters of the Institutional Revolutionary Party – PRI – and Green Party of Mexico – PVEM -), and the next day, February 3 , on the Federal Highway at the high point of the entrance to the waterfalls of Agua Azul, 117 ejidatarios from SSB were arrested by members of the Special Police from the Jungle District Regional Command and Agents of the Special Police from the Regional Indigenous District Command, as well as officers from the Tactical Group of Special Police, transferred to Pakalná police headquarters, and then to the offices of the Prosecutor of the Jungle District at Palenque. The charges were disproportionate: culpable homicide, attempted murder, offences against the peace, physical integrity, and State property and damages.
- December 24, 2011: Bachajón municipal police arrested Juan Vázquez Guzmán; after keeping him disappeared for a couple of hours, he was taken to the State Centre for the Social Reinsertion of the Sentenced (CERSS), in the municipality of Ocosingo, seeking to impute the false charge of homicide to him, which they could not sustain and, hours later, he was freed.
- April 17, 2013: ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, Adherents to the Sixth, publicly denounced new threats and a continuation of [the previous government’s] policy by the official authorities of the present government of the State of Chiapas.
It is important to stress that, faced with continued repression and criminalization of the Adherents to the Sixth, the compañero Juan Vázquez, along with other compañeros, have been tireless promoters in the organization of the defence and struggle of the Tzeltal people of San Sebastián Bachajón and the Agua Azul Zone, systematically denouncing the plans for territorial dispossession promoted by the Mexican government.
In Chiapas the interests of investors, backed up by the Mexican government, insist on implementing their neoliberal projects, which constitute territorial dispossession and which violate the collective rights of indigenous peoples, internationally recognized under ILO Convention 169 and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
Nevertheless, the fact that this territory is in continuing dispute from investment interests linked to neoliberal projects, has led to the original peoples in Chiapas organizing and re-vindicating their territorial rights, as did Juan Vázquez, who is part of the historic struggle for the construction of alternative ways of life to exercise the Right to choose ways of life consistent with the worldview of the people, living well (buen vivir) and a dignified life (vida digna).
This Human Rights Centre demands that the Chiapas government [undertake] a prompt and thorough investigation to locate the whereabouts, and determine the punishment, of the murderer who killed Juan Vázquez, a community leader and human rights defender who gave his life for the defence of territory.
[1] See urgent briefing note, available at: http://www.frayba.org.mx/archivo/noticias/130425_nota_urgente_ssb.pdf
[2] Slides of the Fonatur project:
******************************************************************************
Avalanche of Demonstrations of Support following the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán
May 2, 2013
** Compañeros hold the state government responsible for the death of the Tzeltal leader
** They ask for the aggression to end
** They demand the immediate freedom of professor Alberto Patishtán
By:
In Chiapas the cascade of pronouncements from organizations and communities is continuing, following the death of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, leader of the Sixth in the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido, as well as the repudiation of the violence and threats against the Zapatista support bases in San Marcos Avilés, and the urgent demand for the freedom of Alberto Patishtán Gómez, which should have been decided on Tuesday, April 30.
The ejido of Tila, in the Chol zone in the northern part of the state, designates the state government, as “the party truly responsible” for the death of the Tzeltal leader “and with the most responsibility is the Secretary General of Government, because he has (spent) years destroying the organization of adherents of San Sebastian and the defense of the land and territory of the Agua Azul Waterfalls.” The peasants of Tila assert: “In that (government) agency they call up the corrupt leaders and crooks to offer them programmes and money, on the condition of creating confrontations against those who are organized and are resisting their project of death.” They remembered that in December 2011 “they wanted to put Juan in prison but they couldn’t, therefore now they gave the order to kill him.
“The cowardly assassination is because the government wants to intimidate us and finish us off by means of its mafias. It does not want to see our struggle growing, but we are struggling for our children,” as did “our parents and grandparents, therefore no matter what happens, we will continue.”
The Autonomous Regional Council of the Coastal Zone demanded from the Superior Tribunal of Justice of the State “the immediate freedom of Professor Patishtán Gómez, accused of crimes that he did not commit, as has been fully demonstrated, because we have knowledge that April 30 is the deadline for the tribunal to give its decision”.
The council repudiated the assassination of Vázquez Guzmán in Bachajón and demanded that those materially and intellectually responsible be punished. In particular, the coastal organization stated from Tonalá, Pijijiapan, Mapastepec and Jiquipilas: “We condemn the aggressions and attacks from the bad governments against our Zapatista brothers and sisters in San Marcos Avilés, and we demand that the attacks stop.”
The Tila ejidatarios, adherents to the Sixth, who have continued to mobilize for the restitution of their lands which have been usurped by the Chiapas government’s historic abuse, with the ongoing complicity of the federal tribunals and the successive state legislatures, said they were “saddened and hurt by Juan’s death, because he had his heart in hand for the defence of the territory and learned to struggle supporting his compañeros.” Vázquez “fell in the defence of the land and territory,” they emphasize, and identify with the ejidatarios who are adherents to the Sixth in San Sebastián: “We have seen the Tzeltal and Chol peoples in the same struggle, we share the same history and the same oppressors, which have been the bad governments, the large landholders and big business, who share the ambition of owning our lands and our people”.
Meanwhile, the ten organizations of the Chiapas Network for Peace emphasized that since 2007 the murdered leader had been participating in the defence of his ejido, “a situation for which it has a protective order (amparo), which is currently under review”, and they reported that last April 17, San Sebastián’s ejidatarios made public “new threats on the part of authorities of the current Chiapas government.”
Finally, the Network against Repression emphasized “the interests of big hotel companies and ‘ecological’ tourism in plundering the zone and dispossessing the original inhabitants of their territory”, because “there are commitments between these lords of capitalism, pompously called entrepreneurs, and the federal and local governments”. The government agencies “will do their best to keep the crime unpunished” against Juan Vázquez. “We know that Governor Manuel Velasco Coello would prefer that the indigenous peoples carry him on their shoulders in triumph through the streets, as happened in mid-April in Oxchuc.”
———————————————————-
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Thursday, May 2, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/05/02/politica/027n1pol
*******************************************************************************
Bachajón Ejidatarios demand that Juan Vázquez Guzman’s death does not go unpunished
** The indigenous leader “and adherent to the Other Campaign” was assassinated on Wednesday
** They warn that the struggle over the defense of land and the natural springs “will not be diminished”
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, April 28, 2013
The San Sebastián Bachajón ejidatarios, adherents to the Other Campaign of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, in Chilón, Chiapas, demanded that the assassination of their compañero and representative Juan Vázquez Guzmán, which took place on Wednesday, “is not left unpunished” and warned that: “following the compañero’s death, the struggle must not be diminished: we will continue forward, because we know well that his death was in the defense of our Mother Earth, because the mountains and the natural springs are masters of those who care for them.”
Addressing the Good Government Junta of Los Altos and the National Indigenous Congress, to which the assassinated leader also belonged, the Tzeltal ejidatarios explain that on April 24, at 10 pm “hour of God” (11 pm, “national time”), Vázquez Guzmán “was resting in his house when a person came knocking on his door and he was riddled with six high-caliber bullet, and the man fled in a red pickup truck in the direction of Sitalá”.
In the communiqué “they make known” who Juan Vázquez was: “An active member of the ejido and of the adherents to the Other Campaign. We walked with him for seven years after the Sixth. On April 18, 2010, he was named Secretary General of the three centers of the ejido.”
On December 24, 2011, municipal and judicial police detained him without showing him an arrest warrant, when he was entering his house, and he was taken to prison number 16 in Ocosingo.” Hours later the then Commissioner Francisco Guzmán Guzmán arrived, “carrying a file in his hand and pointing to Compañero Juan as the leader against the neoliberal project but, thanks to the mobilizations of organizations and the intervention of human rights defenders, he was released at midnight and they returned him to his house without making him sign any release paper asking for pardon and forgiveness.”
On November 26 and 27, 2011, Vázquez Guzmán, “accompanied by Compañero Domingo García Gómez, participated in a National Indigenous Congress workshop of dialogue and reflection at San Mateo del Mar (Oaxaca).” He was in charge of following up on the case of protective order (injunction) 274/2011 “against the Neoliberalism Project” and the accompaniment of the three political prisoners from his community.
He maintained his participation in the political prison forums and the mobilizations for the freedom of the political prisoners in Chiapas, in particular of Alberto Patishtán, “and in all Mexico”; also in mobilizations for the defense of the land, like the one on May 7, 2011 in San Cristóbal de Las Casas, and in the Tila and Mitzitón ejidos. He went to the country’s capital “in support of the liberation of the last five San Sebastián Bachajón political prisoners.” He also appeared in several video messages to spread the community’s demands internationally.
———————————————————-
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Monday, April 29, 2013
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/04/29/politica/020n1pol
********************************************************************************
Denouncement by the Adherents to the Sexta from Bachajón, Chiapas on the murder of Juan Vázquez
April 27, 2013
“We demand that this murder does not remain unpunished.
We the men women and children, ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Other Campaign, make a call for solidarity to achieve justice,
Following the death of our compañero, our struggle is not diminished, we will continue moving forward towards our goal, because we know that his death was for the defense of our Mother Earth,
because the mountains and springs belong to those who care for them”.
San Sebastian Bachajón, Adherents to the Other Campaign of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, Chiapas, Mexico, April 27, 2013
TO THE GOOD GOVERNMENT JUNTA
TO THE INDIGENOUS NATIONAL CONGRESS
TO THE NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL ADHERENTS TO THE SIXTH DECLARATION
OF THE SELVA LACANDONA
TO NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS CENTRES
TO NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL CIVIL ORGANIZATIONS
TO THE COMPAÑEROS OF THE OTHER CAMPAIGN NEW YORK, MOVEMENT FOR
JUSTICE IN EL BARRIO
Compañeros, by means of this communiqué, we would like to make known to you:
JUAN VÁZQUEZ GUZMÁN.
An active member of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón; as Adherents to the Other Campaign, we walked beside him for seven years following the sixth declaration of the Lacandon Jungle; after being a member of the organization, he was appointed Secretary General for the three centers on April 18, 2010.
On December 24, 2011, he was arrested by the municipal and judicial police, without even showing him a warrant, when he was entering his house, and he was put in CERESO no 16 in Ocosingo, hours later the commissioner Francisco Guzmán Guzmán arrived, who today is the ex-commissioner, carrying in his hand a folder identifying compañero Juan as leader against the neoliberal project, but thanks to the mobilization of organizations and the intervention of the Human Rights Centre he was released that night at about 12:00 pm and returned home without having to sign any release document or anyone asking his forgiveness or making any apology.
On 26 and 27 November 2011 the compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán, together with compañero Domingo García Gómez, participated in a workshop of dialogue and reflection at the Indigenous National Congress in San Mateo del Mar (Oaxaca).
And he has followed the protection order (amparo) 274/2011 against the Neoliberal project. And the accompaniment of the three political prisoners from SSB.
He has participated in the forums about political imprisonment and in the demonstrations for the freedom of the Chiapas political prisoners, and for the release of compañero ALBERTO PATISHTÁN and throughout Mexico.
And he has been involved with the compañeras of San Sebastian Bachajón for the defense of the land and the mobilization last May 7, 2011, in San Cristobal de Las Casas, Chiapas, in the ejido Tila, in Mitzitón and in DF, and the accompaniment of the release of the last 5 political prisoners from San Sebastián Bachajón, he has been part of several video messages for the release of political prisoners and the defense of Mother Earth.
And other participations. .
4 DAYS AGO
On April 24, 2013, at 10:08 pm, hour of God, our compañero Juan Vazquez Guzmán was resting at home when someone came knocking at his door and he was riddled with 6 high caliber bullets and the culprit fled in a red truck heading toward Sitalá, Chiapas.
And we demand that this murder does not remain unpunished.
We the men women and children, ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Other Campaign, make a call for solidarity to achieve justice. Following the death of our compañero, our struggle is not diminished; we will continue moving forward towards our goal, because we know that his death was for the defense of our Mother Earth, because the mountains and springs belong to those who care for them.
THE STRUGGLE CONTINUES ONWARDS!
ZAPATA LIVES!
JUAN LIVES!
********************************************************************************
Attacks in Chiapas
Gloria Muñoz Ramirez,
Los de Abajo
27 April, 2013
This week, Chiapas was, once again, the scene of violence against the indigenous and campesinos who defend their land and practice autonomy, facts which are blurred in the electronic media, so busy struggling to spread images of the “intolerable violence” – as they call it – of the teachers from Guerrero, who are protesting against the imposition of educational reform, and the students who have taken the rectory of the UNAM.
Both attacks were directly against Zapatistas and pro-Zapatistas. The former are EZLN support bases from the community of San Marcos Avilés, municipality of Chilón, belonging to the caracol of Oventik. The second exemplify the struggle for the defense of their land in San Sebastian Bachajón, home and birthplace of the leader of the adherents of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, Juan Vázquez Guzmán , assassinated by five bullets.
Active in the defense of his community since 2007, Juan Vázquez had denounced on 17 April, along with other ejidatarios adherent to the Zapatista initiative, new threats to their territory from a tourism project in the region.
The climate of violence in Chiapas, a state visited last week by the president Enrique Peña Nieto to kick-start his National Crusade against Hunger, is escalating with direct threats and harassment against those who defend their territory. The attacks have never gone away, it is true, but the violent events of this week are warnings that should not be overlooked, because a political assassination has not occurred in the state for a long time.
The attacks on San Marcos Avilés are not new either, but right now the hostilities are renewed against the families of this community, which, since August 2010 – when they established the autonomous school Emiliano Zapata – have been threatened by members of the group they call “party supporters”. The core of the conflict is the intention to displace them from their land.
In a recent communiqué, the Good Government Junta based in Oventik detailed the daily violations that they have suffered for the last three years, and commented that “the three levels of official government have done nothing to stop the acts of injustice and the violations of their human rights which are being committed against our support bases of the ejido San Marcos Avilés. The response has been one of swearing, ridicule and more threats to our compañeros.”
In Chiapas there is a latent threat of forced displacement against the Zapatistas, and a new political assassination.
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/04/27/index.php?section=politica&article=012o1pol
*******************************************************************
words of the adherents to the sixth declaration from the ejido tila
ejido tila chiapas, april 26 2013
to the compañeros y compañeras of the ejido san sebastian bachajon adherents to the sixth declaration of the lacandon jungle
to the sixth commission of the ezln
to the good government junta of caracol v northern zone
to the indigenous national congress cni
to the adherents to the sexta
to the dignified struggles from the heart of the peoples of mexico and the world
to the different media
compañeros y compañeras
we want to give our word about the cowardly assassination of compañero juan vazquez, compañero in struggle from the ejido san sebastian bachajon, adherents to the sixth declaration of the lacandon jungle, even though we cannot find the words to communicate what we are feeling.
we feel very sad at the death of compañero juan who is a compañero in struggle which is why we are accompanying his departure. and we want, through our word, to give hope and strength to the compañeros y compañeras. we the compañeras feel very pained by his death because he was a compañero who had his heart in his hand for the defence of the territory we are sad because the compañero learned to struggle by supporting his compañeros and he gave a good example to follow which was doing his work and keeping on walking and fighting.
juan vazquez is a compañero fallen in defence of the land and territory, which is why today we make clear that the sixth from the ejido tila is with the compañeros y compañeras of san sebastian bachajon and that they are not alone. we will always struggle, because we remain united, because this is what makes us stronger, that every community, tribe and group when they unite have just one heart between them.
with the compañeros and compañeras ejidatarios and adherents from san sebastian we can see that we have the same struggle in the defence of mother earth and territory as indigenous Tseltal and Ch’ol peoples. and because we share the same history with them and have the same oppressors who have been the bad governments and large landholders and businessmen who share the same ambition in their hearts to be the owners of our land and our people.
we want to say that we have the memory of so much repression during these years and we state that those truly responsible for his death are the state government and the most responsible is the secretary of government because he has spent years destroying the organization of the adherents of the ejido san sebastian and the defence of the land and territory of the waterfalls of agua azul. because we know well that it is this government agency where they call corrupt and wicked leaders to provide programmes and money conditional on creating confrontations against those of us who are organized and resisting their project of death. and we remember that the compañero was illegally detained in december 2011 when they wanted to put him in prison but they could not, now in their cowardly way they have sent people to kill him.
the cowardly murder is because the government wants wants to intimidate us and to finish us off through their mafia. because they do not want to see us continue fighting and our struggle growing, but what we are fighting for, we are fighting for our children, like our grandfathers and grandmothers fought. this means that whatever happens we will continue organizing and fighting.
we want to say that compañero juan is not dead, he is in each of our hearts and thoughts. He is in the struggle of the ejido san sebastian bachajon adherents to the sixth declaration and in the struggle we walk together in defence of our land and territory and freedom along with many compañeros and compañeras from mexico and the world. the compañero is now a seed which has sprouted and will continue to grow and will produce many juanes.
as a people our heart is below and to the left, it is there we keep our memory as many other peoples have done, and this is what maintains us as countrymen who give our life for our people. because over very many years of struggle in which many have fallen we know that they are one more example that it is better to die on your feet than to live on your knees to the bad government.
we raise our hand saying:
memory and life in our heart for compañero juan
long live the struggle of ejido san sebastian bachajon adherents to the sixth
long live the organized people
respectfully
land and freedom
ejido tila adherents to the sixth
*********************************************************************
Leader of the Pro-Zapatista Ejidatarios of Bachajón, Chiapas, is Assassinated
** Warnings of attempts at dispossession in this territory since April 17
** Juan Vázquez Guzmán was killed with five shots in front of his house on Wednesday night
By: Hermann Bellinghausen,
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, April 25, 2013
The leader of the ejidatarios, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle in San Sebastián Bachajón, Juan Vázquez Guzmán, was murdered on Wednesday night by unidentified individuals who killed him with five shots. The incident occurred around 11:00 o’clock at night outside his home, the ejidatarios reported.
This morning, the Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Human Rights Center (Frayba) condemned the murder of the man who was the Secretary General of the adherents to the Sixth in San Sebastián Bachajón, Chilón municipality. Vázquez Guzmán “stood out for his active participation in defence of land and territory in the face of the governmental plunder of the Agua Azul Waterfalls and the imposition of the ticket booth at the entrances.”
Neighbours in the region, Frayba adds, “say that Juan was attacked just when he was arriving at his home, and the attackers escaped aboard a red double-cabin pickup truck, which took the highway that leads to the Sitalá municipal headquarters,” which connects with “the municipalities of Ocosingo, Cancuc and Chilón.”
Since 2007, Vázquez Guzmán participated actively in the defence of the ejido’s territory, “for which reason it carried a protective order (amparo), currently on review in the Third Collegiate Tribunal, in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, under the record number 118/2013.”
It is appropriate to remember that on April 17 the ejidatarios, who are adherents to the Sixth, denounced that their territory “is threatened by the official policy of dispossession, which is continuing under the current state government.” The previous (government) stood out for persecuting the ejidatarios resisting the dispossession, for tourism purposes, of part of their lands, with the direct participation of the then and now Secretary of Government, Noé Castañón León, according to repeated accusations from the Tzeltal ejidatarios.
At the same time, the Network against Repression in Chiapas considered it “evident that it is a political assassination, by the multiple business, political and economic interests in the zone.” And from the San Cristóbal de las Casas prison, the prisoners of the Voice of El Amate (La Voz del Amate) and Those in Solidarity with the Voice of El Amate condemned the acts and demanded that the authorities investigate and punish those responsible.
In a situation of rising tension in that part of the Chilón municipality, new harassments and threats against the adherents to the Sixth in the Jotolá ejido have also been reported in recent weeks.
____________________________________________________
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Friday, April 26, 2013
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/04/26/politica/028n1pol
*********************************************************************
Murder of Compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán from Bachajón
Compañer@s
It is with profound sadness and outrage that we share the news of the murder of our compañero Juan Vázquez Guzmán, former Secretary General of the adherents to the Sixth Declaration from the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón.
La lucha sigue
Colectivo Radio Zapatista
25 April, 2013
********************************************************************************
San Cristobal de Las Casas, Chiapas
April 25, 2013
Frayba Urgent Information Note
Ejidatario from The Other Campaign in Bachajón Chiapas is Murdered
The Centre for Human Rights condemns the assassination of Juan Vázquez Guzmán, former Secretary General of the adherents to the Other Campaign (La Sexta) in the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón, who was noted for his active participation in the defense of Land and Territory against the government plunder of the Agua Azul Waterfalls and the imposition of the Toll Booth at the entrance.
According to information given to this Centre, on Wednesday April 24 at 23:00 pm persons unknown shot Juan Vázquez five times, killing him instantly.
Neighbors say that Juan was attacked just as he was arriving home, the attackers immediately fled in a red van, with a double cab, taking the road to the municipal headquarters of Sitalá, thus also having access to the roads to the municipalities of Ocosingo, Cancúc and Chilón.
Since 2007, Juan Vázquez had been active in the defense of the Land and Territory of San Sebastian Bachajónone, a situation for which they held an order for legal protection (amparo) which is currently being reviewed in the Third Collegiate Court, based in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, under case number 118/2013.
On April 17th the ejidatarios of San Sebastian Bachajón, adherents to the Other Campaign of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, publicly denounced two that their Territory is being threatened by the official policy of territorial dispossession which is continuing under the current state government.
1 Video of the struggle for the defense of the Territory, available at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=dcTspD7NKmY #!
2 See note and statement available at: http://sipaz.wordpress.com/2013/04/19/chiapas-adherentes-a-la-otra-campana-de-san-sebastian-bachajon-denuncian-despojo-e-impunidad/
**********************************************************
Land grabbing at Agua Azul, Chiapas is denounced
Tzeltales: we are living in a nightmare because we trusted the authorities
We are imprisoned and threatened for not prostituting our territory, they say
Hermann Bellinghausen
La Jornada, Thursday April 18, 2013,
San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas, April 17.
Our trust of all Mexicans has turned into a nightmare, declared the Tzeltal ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, municipality of Chilón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, on denouncing the “impunity of dispossession” and of “justice in the service of the State”, that have allowed the perpetuation of the theft of land in their ejido, and the imposition of a toll booth at the Agua Azul waterfalls, foreign to the people.
In evaluating the previous state government of Juan Sabines Guerrero, which persecuted and imprisoned many of these same ejidatarios, the indigenous reaffirm their determination to resist “the dispossession” in which officials were involved, “in the service of private interests”, with “two-faced media action to destroy our process of struggle”.
Since adhering to the Sixth Declaration of the EZLN in 2007, when they organized “to defend our mother earth and her natural resources”, they say, “we have been subjected to imprisonment, persecution, harassment and threats” for refusing to “prostitute our lands”.
In 2011, “after the violence, the lies to legitimize the policies of the bad government” and through the “political commitments” of government-supporting ejidatarios to “conditions of supposed development, infrastructure plans, eco-archaeological tourism and fighting poverty”, the ejidatarios in resistance concluded that all this, “aimed at the territorial dispossession and genocide of our people, deepens the division in the social fabric of the community”. They hold the authorities responsible, while the government-supporting ejidatarios acted “under false pretences and lies, through economic support and political commitments that eventually ended up in the abyss of lies and betrayal”.
The situation continued with the return of the Institutional Revolutionary Party and the Green Ecological Party of Mexico, laden with commitments, while the outgoing government “left empty coffers”. Even though Chiapas is “in austerity”, new federal and state officials continue to talk of “reforms to health and education, if not for a school to reach the communities, for an aspirin in the health centres”.
The ejidatarios believe that “the struggle for the recognition of indigenous rights and culture remains forgotten by the authorities, and the organized people are seeking alternatives, with the aim of politically and economically supporting themselves without relying on the hand-outs and crumbs that the government shares out in order to legitimize its policy of failure”.
They recognize, that thanks to the intervention of national and international groups and organisations active in supporting human rights, “the illegality of our land dispossession can be proved”. The government in its turn, they added, “leaves us, like a date in their diary of engagements, amparo (order for legal protection) number 274/2011. If the authorities of justice “in the government service try to shut us up, they are making a mistake; we are building other alternatives of life, without forgetting our errors and differences”.
The government and its public servants have already used all available means to silence our voices, including the “unjust imprisonment of Antonio Estrada Estrada, Miguel Vázquez Deara, and Miguel Demeza Jiménez, victims of the authorities through their lack of capacity and independence” in applying the law.
They greeted “the other compañeros who are also prisoners, for speaking out because “from their suffering comes another form of struggle: the experience of surviving in prison without having committed any crime teaches us to resist”. They especially recognized Alberto Patishtán Gómez: “With a simple and humble heart in his words, he (is) a great compañero, who they thought they could silence with political prison walls, and who will always be present in our cries and in the way of our struggle”.
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/04/18/index.php?section=politica&article=023n1pol
********************************************************************************
Communique from San Sebastian Bachajón April 17, 2013
San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Other Campaign of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, Chiapas, Mexico. April 17, 2013
To the people of Mexico and the world
To the compañer@s of the national and international other campaign
To the mass and alternative media
To national and international human rights defenders
To the Good Government Juntas
To public opinion
Sisters and brothers, from the northern zone of Chiapas, San Sebastián Bachajón, Mexico.
From the impunity of dispossession to hope. The story of this six year period of government, impunity from justice in the service of the state, after a year of struggle and resistance to displacement, with the participation of authorities and officials from various departments and institutions in the service of private interests, the six years of state and federal government, with its double face and its media action to destroy our process of struggle, san Sebastian Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration, then and now, since 2007, when we organized to defend our mother earth and natural resources, we have been objects of imprisonment, persecution, harassment, and threats against leaders and representatives who refuse to prostitute our lands.
In 2011, after the violence, the lies to legitimize the policies of the bad government, through the political commitments of government-supporting ejidatarios to conditions of supposed development, infrastructure plans, eco-archaeological tourism and fighting poverty, which at its roots is aimed at the territorial dispossession and genocide of our people, deepening the division in the social fabric of the community; in this event the authorities and government-supporting ejidatarios participated under false pretences and lies, through economic support and political commitments that eventually ended up in the abyss of lies and betrayal; now the illicit enrichment of the official authorities, a commitment far from the truth, as always, the habit that politicians have to advance a compromise that will ultimately end up plundering the wealth of all Mexicans.
The situation continued with the return of the Institutional Revolutionary Party and the Green Ecological Party of Mexico, laden with commitments, Mexicans and Chiapans, they thought that, with a single stroke, Mexico would be transformed economically and politically, while the truth was, that the outgoing government left empty coffers with a worse public debt; even though Chiapas is in austerity, new federal and state officials continue to talk of reforms to health and education, if not for a school to reach the communities, for an aspirin in the health centres, nothing more is prescribed for a headache, which makes a policy with the people and for the people.
The trust of all Mexicans has turned into a nightmare, of course they did not vote for trust, nor for the interest of the few who favoured the victory so as to revive the same ideology of Salinas, the struggle for the recognition of indigenous rights and culture remains forgotten by the authorities, and the organized people are seeking alternatives, with the aim of politically and economically supporting themselves without relying on the hand-outs and crumbs that the government shares out in order to legitimize its policy of failure.
Thanks to the intervention of national and international groups and organisations active in supporting human rights, the illegality of our land dispossession can be proved. The government in its turn, leaves us, like a date in their diary of engagements, amparo (order for legal protection) number 274/2011. If the authorities of justice in the government service try to shut us up, they are making a mistake; we are building other alternatives of life, without forgetting our errors and differences.
Injustice, repression, persecution, plunder, threats, for us is a reflection to distinguish the real enemy; since the government and its public servants have already used all available means to silence our voices, including the unjust imprisonment of Antonio Estrada Estrada, Miguel Vázquez Deara, and Miguel Demeza Jiménez, victims of the authorities through their lack of capacity and independence in applying the law; not counting the other compañeros who are also prisoners, a combative greeting for them for speaking out because from their suffering comes another form of struggle: the experience of surviving in prison without having committed any crime teaches us to resist; with a simple and humble heart in his words, a great compañero, who they thought they could silence with political prison walls, take courage teacher, April 15 this year is his birthday, may it be the best, so that wishes such as red wine, now that his birthday has past may he have relief from his pain and anger, because of his suffering he will always be present in our cries and in the way of our struggle, congratulations Profe. Alberto Patishtan Gomez.
Long live our political prisoners, we will continue demanding until we achieve freedom for all, because our word is stronger than the walls of the prison, together we will break barriers, health and greetings to them.
Our combative embrace from men and women
From the northern zone of Chiapas, Mexico
Adherents to the sixth declaration of the Lacandon Jungle
Respectfully
Land and Freedom
General Coordinator of the Other Campaign
******************************************************************************
17th April: International Day in Solidarity with Political Prisoners
The Prisoners from San Sebastián Bachajón
The prisoners from Bachajón are in jail for defending their land from businesses and tourist projects imposed by the government and Mexican and international businesses which loot and destroy. Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Vásquez Deara were detained in 2011, brutally tortured and imprisoned for fabricated crimes. According to their own testimony, this was because of their participation in the resistance of people from San Sebastián Bachajón who are adherents to La Sexta. In 2010, Miguel Demeza Jiménez was unjustly detained, tortured and accused of a kidnapping he did not commit. All three are still in prison today, in jails in Playas de Catzajá, Ocosingo and El Amate, in Chiapas.
The ejido community of San Sebastián Bachajón is located in the centre of Chiapas in the Selva zone. The official municipality is Chilón and it is the Autonomous Zapatista region of San Jose in Rebellion. It is a strategic position for capitalist firms and tourism projects which the government is implementing because it contains one of the most beautiful natural spots in the world: the Agua Azul Cascades. It is important to mention a mechanism of territorial control introduced here by the state in the last 13 years. It brings together ‘strategic resources’ (Land, water, biodiversity in flora and fauna, cultural knowledge, etc) in ‘protection capsules’ identified by state institutions and designated as Areas of Protection for Flora and Fauna (APFF). The value of nature reflects its genetic riches, capacity for carbon capture, plentiful water supply and potential for tourism. In the case of the ‘Agua Azul Cascades Biosphere Reserve’ it results from this strategy of land-grabbing, together with the bad government’s demagogic promotion of ‘eco-tourism’.
The tourist complex has been the object of financial speculation for 20 years by the big hotel consortia. Carols Rojas, Secretary for Social Development at SEDESOL during the presidency of Salinas, began to realise his dreams in the region, exploiting natural beauty through tourism. The model was the Agua Azul cascades, with the proposal to build a tourist centre to rival Cancún. It would be called the Agua Azul Cascades Integrally Planned Centre (CIP-CAA in Spanish). However, the project was wrecked by the EZLN uprising in 1994 which brought in the revolutionary land law and later the creation of the Zapatista Autonomous Rebel Municipalities which reconfigured the geography of Zapatista resistance. Drawing on part of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, in 2008 over 1800 community members, supporters of the Other Campaign, decided to take over the running of the payment kiosk at this tourist complex. This was in the exercise of their right to use and enjoyment of their land.
Meanwhile, however, in March 2008 a joint proposal was put forward by Norton Consulting Inc and EDSA Construction under the Mesoamerican Project (Plan Puebla-Panama). This was “to develop the economy of the Selva zone of Chiapas through tourism”. The study aimed to develop a strategic plan and identify spaces and projects which could offer the most possibilities for tourism – “the more visitors, the more spending” – for what would be the CIP-CAA. The first stage of the project will be to promote a hotel chain whose concept is the “lodge/retreat”’ and to convert the Agua Azul Cascades into one of “the most special resort experiences in the western hemisphere”. There are four types of investment for the world’s top luxury tourist chains: world class boutique hotel, a lodge/retreat near Agua Azul, a European brand five star hotel, and a resort with a hotel, conference centre and golf course. The operators being considered for investment are Luxury Collection, Orient Express and Aman. Their room rates range from 300 to 1000 dollars per night (3,800 to 10,800 pesos). Among the European hotels are Sonesta, Barceló, Sol Melia and Kempinsky, Hotel, conference and golf complexes include Camino Real, Posadas, Park, Royal, Marriot, Hyatt and Westin.
Similarly, the federal government’s strategy is presented by the National Fund for Tourism (FONATUR) in collaboration with institutions at state and federal level, such as the Chiapas Secretariat for Tourism, the Secretariat for Tourism and International Relations, the Secretariat for Communications and Transport (SCT), the Federal Attorney for Environmental Protection (PROFEPA) and the national Institute for Anthropology and History (INAH). it states that the state government of Chiapas has these main tasks: to promote, create and operate eight tourist routes, among which is the corridor from Palenque to San Cristobal de la Casas, via Agua Azul and Toniná.
The context where the conflict sprang up over the running of the payment kiosk at Agua Azul is a reflection of the dispute between the supporters of the interests of big Capital, transnationals and the party political system and on the other hand those who defend the land which gives life and sustains the economy, culture and politics of indigenous Mayan communities. They are building autonomous alternatives with dignity against the system of death which capitalism. In this context, the compas of La Sexta have been detained for opposing the plunder and destruction of this region. For the moment, there has been no further communication with the compas. Nor have they put out any communiqué. Therefore, we continue to await the resolution of their cases.
Extracts from communiqués on the Bachajón prisoners from the Network against repression and for Solidarity in Chiapas and from the Working Group We are not all here http://noestamostodxs.noblogs.org/
From Liberons-les: Libertad
********************************************************************************
Bachajón Ejido Owners Accuse the Government of “Scorning the Indigenous”
February 6, 2013
** They demand the release of three sympathizers of the Zapatista Army
** A federal judge denies them legal protection to reclaim the lands that were taken away from them
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
The ejido owners of San Sebastián Bachajón (municipality of Chilón, Chiapas) accused the government and justice authorities of showing “contempt for we the indigenous,” because a federal judge has denied them legal protection for recuperating the lands which were taken from them for tourist purposes. They also demanded the release of their three compañeros, currently imprisoned in different state prisons.
“Because our compañeros Miguel Vázquez Deara (currently in the State Centre for Social Re-insertion of the Sentenced, Cerss number 16, El Encino, in Ocosingo), Miguel Demeza Jiménez (in the Cerss 14, El Amate, in Cintalapa de Figueroa) and Antonio Estrada Estrada (in the Cerss 17, in Playas de Catazajá), are unjustly imprisoned for fabricated crimes, they continue to suffer injustice through the lack of impartiality and independence of the judicial authorities who favour the interests of the bad government.”
In the face of the economic and psychological suffering of their family members, the Tzeltal ejido owners, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, add, “we now understand what it is to struggle for another”.
Furthermore, last January 30 the judge of the seventh district in Tuxtla Gutiérrez, José del Carmen Constantino Avendaño, “as a lackey and servant of the bad government which plunders our lands, denied the protective order” promoted by Mariano Moreno Guzmán, the ejido owners’ representative.
“Following the violence of the armed group that the government itself instructed to act violently on February 2, 2011, it took the opportunity to illegally install itself on our lands, just because Commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez and the vigilance council members Melchorio Pérez Moreno, officialists, betrayed their people by signing an agreement on February 13, supposedly for peace and reconciliation, but in that same document handed over our lands without the authorization of the ejido assembly.”
The indigenous denounce: “Rather than bringing peace, it is an agreement to plunder and abuse the people of Bachajón. As if this was not enough, in the protective order, Guzmán Jiménez and the Secretary of Government, Noé Castañón León, presented an alleged act of assembly” held the evening before, “without convocation or signature of the ejido owners. It has no value because that assembly never took place. It has only the signatures of the ejido’s officialist (pro-government) representatives to authorize the donation of our lands.”
They accuse Judge Constantino Avendaño of sitting “tranquilly at his desk with his big salary, and with one stroke of the pen he denies justice to our people” letting it be seen that he is at the service of power “without wisdom or honesty.” They anticipate: “We will continue to exhaust all instances (appeals?) and resist State repression from our territory.” That is how their ancestors defended the territory, they maintain, “and it is the legacy that we have to defend.”
The San Sebastián ejido owners reaffirm their commitment to the Sixth (la Sexta) “national and international” and they call for, “from the different corners and forms of struggle, let us begin by taking other alternatives to continue confronting the capitalist monster, which is pledged to continue taking away what is ours, our dignity of being who we are.”
Lastly, they warn: “We are not going to be silent about their promotion of the National Crusade against Hunger, we do not live from charity, we are waiting for the San Andrés Accords signed by the Mexican government to be fulfilled, wherein our rights as indigenous peoples are recognized.”
——————————————————–
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Wednesday, February 6, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/02/06/politica/018n1pol
********************************************************************************
Denial of motion to ejidararios adherents to the Sixth Declaration from San Sebastián Bachajón
Sipaz
On 31 January, the definitive judgment to deny a motion to ejidatarios from San Sebastián Bachajón regarding the return of their common-lands which were occupied by state authorities and a group close to the government was made public, this within the context of the dispute over possession of the control-point that is seen at the entrance of the Agua Azul waterfall.
The motion had been promoted by Mariano Moreno Guzmán, a Tseltal indigenous man from the ejido, with the juridical identity of “substitute representation of ejidal goods,” so as to avoid the privatization of land in question, their being collective. As Moreno Guzmán’s lawyers commented (Maribel González Pedro y Ricardo Lagunes Gasca), the General Assembly of the ejido did not provide its consent to the convention signed in February 2011 between the state government and the “officialist”authorities who recently turned over the common lands. According to defense lawyers, during the trial the president of the ejidal commission, Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, and the state government showed a document called “act of assembly” which confronted an objection, due to its not complying with established standards as stipulated in agrarian laws and international law on indigenous rights. Regardless, the judge in the case declared Moreno Guzman’s attempt invalid, as it would supposedly not represent the requisite“substituted representation,” instead recognizing the “assembly act,” thus supporting the transfer of lands in dispute to the Chiapas government.
González Pedro and Lagunes Gasca noted that the sentence of the judge constitutes “a disregard for indigenous peoples and the constitutional reforms of motion and human rights.” The ejidatarios who adhere to the EZLN’s Sixth Declaration, for their part, indicated that after showing “the necessary documents that justify and evidence the looting of our common-use lands from the community of San Sebastián Bachajon, the authorities of justice continue defending the interests of the government.”
********************************************************************************
“The Law Is not Made for the Poor,” Lament Bachajón Ejido Owners
** It does not make amends for the appropriation of lands by the government
** The imparters of justice are compromised with the politicians, they assert
Hermann Bellinghausen,
San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas, February 1, 2013
“The law is not made for us poor,” conclude the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido owners in response to a judge’s refusal to grant them a protective order against the Chiapas government’s alienation of common use lands in their community territory. This took place in a process where the behaviour of the Secretary General of Government, Noé Castañón León, has been very active and conspicuous. Following the change of state administration he remains in the same position that he occupied in the government of Juan Sabines Guerrero.
From Bachajón, Chilón municipality, in the Northern Zone, the indigenous denounced “the authorities who impart justice” for having “a lot to do with the projects of the three levels of government,” and being “accomplices of the high officials who control justice”, because “they protect the interests of the political class”. This, “after a long legal process, where we have provided sufficient documentation to justify and highlight the unjust dispossession of our lands.”
The ejido owners, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, maintain that “because of the political situation that we are living in, the authorities are above our rights as indigenous peoples, as is confirmed by the consummation of yet another fraud against the people of Mexico, with the imposition of the administrator,” elected –the indigenous say– “through a costly electoral simulation.
“The workers of the field and the city are preparing to confront a new regime which, without abandoning its policy of social devastation, now seeks to combine that policy with the use of a project for buying consciences through the Secretary of Social Development,” commented the ejido owners.
“To combat the ‘hunger’ that they have (the rulers) need to attract foreign investors to recuperate the economy.” Then they repress, harass, threaten and incarcerate the leaders “of the organizations that refuse to prostitute their lands.”
Regarding “the so-called National Crusade against Hunger,” the ejido owners point out that the officials “could not find another name, after they had already used them all to humiliate the people with Progress or Opportunities”. For the clients of the programmes and government handouts the “last thing” that was left to ask for was “the offerings from the dead.”
The official hurry is so great, the ejido owners say, “that the local deputy Carlos Jiménez Trujillo is already visiting communities of the ejido to offer ecotourist projects. There are no resources for municipal support, but there are for tourist projects.” For six years “we have been enduring dispossessions, injustice, repression, prison” “for resisting an upmarket tourist project on our lands”, knocking at the doors of the institutions that supposedly defend the rights of the peoples.
The authorities that impart justice “are getting even with us in all aspects to intimidate the process of our struggle”. As a consequence, they warn that they will take “alternative” action.
New Sentence for a prisoner from the Voice of El Amate
In another legal setback for adherents to the Sixth, Rosario Díaz Méndez, prisoner and member of the Voice of El Amate (Voz del Amate), was again sentenced by Judge Jaqueline Ángel, of the Simojovel judicial district, to 25 years in prison, notwithstanding that Díaz Méndez “provided all the necessary evidence to prove his innocence”. The very person supposedly wronged has shown to the Public Ministry that it was not he (Rosario) and has demanded the liberation of the accused. Also all the witnesses, for both the defence and the prosecution, have declared that Rosario “did not have anything to do with the murder” for which he has been indicted, and have called for his liberation.
The Voice of El Amate and (those in) Solidarity with the Voice of El Amate denounced this “gross violation of human rights” from the San Cristóbal prison, where the indigenous native of Huitiupán has been imprisoned since 2005. “Justice is blind and being blind those who work in judging do everything backwards”, maintained the prisoners of the Sixth.
In spite of “all the evidence of innocence”, the “inept” Judge Ángel “never evaluated it”. The prisoners are asking the Chiapas government to intervene “immediately” for the freedom of the convicted man.
———————————————–
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Saturday, February 2, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/02/02/politica/019n1pol
***************************************************************************
Protective Order is denied to San Sebastián Bachajón Ejido Owners
** Tzeltals demand that they return the occupied lands to them
By: Hermann Bellinghausen, Envoy
Tuxtla Gutiérrez, Chiapas, January 31, 2013
A federal judge denied the protective order (amparo) requested by the Tzeltal ejido owners (ejidatarios) of San Sebastián Bachajón, Chilón municipality, who for two years have been demanding the return of lands occupied by government authorities and local officialist (pro-government) groups. The ejido owners, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, were violently dispossessed by civilians with the backup of public force, from common use lands, to promote the Agua Azul Waterfalls tourist project in Tumbalá municipality, on February 2, 2011.
The lawyers Ricardo Lagunes Gasca and Maribel González Pedro, legal representatives of the ejido owners, pointed out today that “the arbitrary considerations of Judge José del Carmen Constantino Avendaño unequivocally constitute a lack of impartiality and independence in his jurisdictional function” and denote “contempt for indigenous peoples and for the constitutional reforms for legal protection and human rights.”
Today, as the district’s seventh judge, Constantino Avendaño, made public his definitive decision, handed down this Thursday, within the request for a protective order (injunction) requested by Mariano Moreno Guzmán, with the legal character of “substitute representation of the ejidal property” by the partial and definitive deprivation of San Sebastián Bachajón’s common use lands, “by local and federal authorities, with the complicity of the officialist Commissioners and Vigilance Council” usurping their functions.
According to Lagunes and González Pedro, “this determination is paradigmatic as evidence that some judges give in to pressure from the authorities to deprive indigenous peoples of their lands”, and set forth “the big challenge to the Judicial Power of the Federation to ensure a change of mentality in its officials of all ranks”, allowing a “different way of applying the law from the broader perspective, progressive and protective of human rights”.
Moreno Guzmán, the defenders add, “clearly stated in his application that the acts complained of constitute a partial and definitive deprivation of common use lands, in other words of collective rights, stating that the General Assembly, the highest body of the ejido”, did not give its consent for the federal and state governments “to take possession of the lands in litigation, so the filing of the demand is not subject to any time limit for conforming with Article 217 of the Law for Protective Relief”. This was because the judge considered the complaint to be out of time.
Moreno Guzmán exhibited before the judge the February 13, 2011 “agreement” in which the San Sebastián ejido authorities, “without the authorization or consent of the Assembly, handed over the common use lands”. Although, de facto, these pieces of land “were already in the possession of the State, since February 2, following the violent eviction of indigenous adherents of the Sixth by a group of armed civilians.”
During the process of the lawsuit for the protective order, the Secretary General of Government and the officialist president of the Ejido Commission, Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, delivered a document which they called “minutes of assembly.” This was “objected to in time and form” for failing to comply with the standards set by agrarian legislation and international treaties in matters of indigenous peoples’ rights. It was “developed to simulate the legality of the ‘agreement’.”
In the defenders’ judgment, these documents “have no validity”, nor do they constitute “the free, prior and informed consent of the ejido’s highest body with respect to the acts of dispossession”. At the same time, “the behaviour of the officialist representatives before and afterwards shows that they do not represent the collective interests of their community”, but rather “watch over the interests of the government to appropriate that indigenous territory for themselves and undermine the social movement that defends it”.
———————————————
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Friday, February 1, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/02/01/politica/027n1pol
********************************************************************************
Chilón Indigenous Demand Rights in Lawsuit for Protection from Dispossession of Lands
** In a letter to Juan N. Silva Meza they denounce state and private tourist projects
By: Hermann Bellinghausen,
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, January 25, 2013
The ejido owners (ejidatarios) from San Sebastián Bachajón, Chilón municipality, yesterday directed themselves to Minister Juan N. Silva Meza, president of the Federal Judiciary, in relation to the conflict that the community is going through because of a “governmental land grab,” whose purpose, they maintained, “is the implementation of state and private up-market tourist projects, without consulting or taking into account our rights as indigenous peoples recognized in the Constitution and in international human rights treaties.”
Adherents to the Other Campaign of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, the ejido owners write to the magistrate: “Last January 18, the seventh district judge in Tuxtla Gutiérrez held the constitutional hearing on the lawsuit for protection (amparo) 274/2011, and we are hoping for a just resolution, protective of the rights of our people, to avoid unfortunate acts difficult to repair.”
“The situation of our protective order” remains in the hands of the authorities “because we are not disposed to permit authorities to trample on the imparting of justice,” they added. “We have contributed all the evidence to demonstrate the injustice of which we have repeatedly and continuously been the object, as well as the legitimate and legal right that we have as ejido owners and members of the Tzeltal people to defend and enjoy our ancestral territory.”
The document was also sent to the executive secretary of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in Washington and the Office of the High Commissioner of the United Nations for Human Rights in Mexico, “for your knowledge and intervention.”
Mariano Moreno Guzmán, Mariano Moreno López and Miguel Álvaro Deara, representatives of the ejido owners, affirm that on February 2, 2011, different federal authorities and those of Chiapas “arbitrarily and in an authoritarian manner took possession of an area of our common use lands, located on the land grant, by means of the use of public force and the participation of armed civilians.”
The action, which imposed a governmental ticket booth for visitor access to the Agua Azul Cascades, in the neighbouring municipality of Tumbalá, had the support of the ejido’s commissioners and the vigilance council, “instructed by authorities of different agencies of the state government,” according to “information obtained through an informant, whose name was not mentioned for fear of acts that put his physical integrity in danger.” They point out to the magistrate that on various occasions they denounced it without obtaining an answer.
Faced with that, and “despite the strong threats against them,” they filed the mentioned petition for a protective order “for the protection of our territory and the collective rights over our common use lands.” In your capacity as president counsellor of the Federal Judiciary Council, the indigenous ask Silva Meza “that he watch over and guarantee” that the lower court in Tuxtla Gutiérrez “has the conditions of impartiality, objectivity and independence to resolve the petition for a protective order that was presented approximately two years ago.”
Saturday, January 26, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/01/26/politica/018n1pol
*********************************************************************
Chiapas Ejido Owners of Chilón Hope that their Lands will be protected
** The corresponding constitutional hearing had to be held on the 18th January
** They reiterate their determination to resist the dispossession they have suffered
By: Hermann Bellinghausen, Envoy
San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas, January 19, 2013
The ejido owners of San Sebastián Bachajón, an ejido located in the Chilón municipality, who are adherents to the Other Campaign, announced that they are awaiting the resolution next Monday of the protective order (amparo) filed in 2011 with the authorities in defence of their territory. They also reiterated their determination to resist the plunder of their lands and territorial rights which they have suffered for years due to action by the government in collaboration with officialist (pro-government) ejido owners and groups from the neighbouring ejido and spa at Agua Azul.
The constitutional hearing on their protective order (amparo), case number 274/2011, had to be held on Friday (December 18), although the ejido owners were not able to confirm this. If the hearing was held, the seventh district court in Tuxtla Gutiérrez would have to publish the reason for their decision on the 21st, or whether they had deferred it to a new date. “For one year we have respected the legal process for our protective order (injunction), and demonstrated with documents the illegality of the acts that were being carried out unjustly on the ejido lands.”
They pointed out that on several occasions they have documented that the National Commission for Natural Protected Areas “is altering the coordinates of the 1980 presidential decree.” The protective order must proceed; if it does not, the authorities “would be passing over their own laws.” The mentioned proceeding “puts the plunder (dispossession) of our lands into evidence, we are very clear about what the bad government seeks to do with the indigenous”.
And they added: “We want to let the three levels of government know that we continue alive despite the fact that they attempted to destroy us, to buy us off, to make us surrender, and that they attacked us militarily and politically. They did not succeed, we remain alive.” This, “even though they had pledged to dispossess us, as they did on February 2, 2011 at the entrances to the Agua Azul Waterfalls ecotourist centre.” The “unjust plunder” realized “in complicity with authorities from different agencies” by the pro-government ejido authorities of San Sebastián Bachajón, who “seek to alter the ejidal documents” in favour of the ecotourist project, remains unresolved.
The Tzeltal ejido owners of the Other Campaign, who have suffered prison, attacks, permanent police vigilance and governmental media campaigns to pass them off as criminals, warn: “We are not leaving here, we want to continue being what we are,” though there are even ejido owners who “for lack of a conscience” and “because of the ambition of the PRD, PAN, PRI and PVEM parties,” want “to deliver our lands into the hands of the bad government.”
They point out that: “the political parties do not need us to fail in their counterinsurgency policy; nor do we need them, because of the impunities we are learning to survive and seeking alternatives for governing ourselves as indigenous peoples.”
They reaffirm their commitment to struggle with “the other organizations and collectives from below and to the left to together demand that the three levels of government fulfil the San Andrés Accords, signed by the federal government in 1996, on indigenous rights and culture.”
Appealing to the national and international Other Campaign, the ejido owners concluded: “Our first step will be to continue constructing our autonomy without losing identity. We are not going to permit that they continue violating our rights. We are fed up with the fact that the authorities continue intimidating us for defending our Mother Earth; that is our only crime, for which we are persecuted.” They said that seeking “other alternatives in our communities is the hope that we have, the path that our Zapatista brothers and sisters taught us to follow.”
———————————————————-
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Sunday, January 20, 2013
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2013/01/20/politica/017n1pol
********************************************************************************
San Sebastian Bachajón, adherents to the Other Campaign and the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, Chiapas, Mexico. January 18, 2013.
To the people of Mexico and the world
To the compañer@s of the national and international Other Campaign
To the mass and alternative media
To defenders of national and international human rights
To the Good Government Juntas
To public opinion
Sisters and brothers: from the north of Chiapas, San Sebastian Bachajón, Chiapas, Mexico.
Our message is from the men and women, ejidatarias and ejidatarios, adherents to the Other Campaign, after a year of repression, deprivation, injustice, harassment and wrongful imprisonment. We want to let the three levels of government know that we are still alive even though they tried to destroy us, buy us, make us surrender and attacked us militarily, politically and ideologically.
To all the people who followed the current of the political spectrum of the bad governments, which have done their best to destroy us politically, militarily, and ideologically. Well, they did not succeed, we are still alive.
Despite their determination to make the entire political spectrum believe that we no longer exist, despite the party political campaign to disintegrate society, we are still alive, and that is what strengthens us to continue our struggles.
It is very evident that political parties do not need us to fail in their counterinsurgency policy, nor do we need them[i]; because of the impunity, we are learning to survive and looking for other alternatives to govern ourselves as the indigenous peoples we are, continuing our struggles always, we are accompanying the people with a greater awareness of the path to follow.
We reaffirm our commitment to struggle for other organizations and groups from below and to the left, so that together we can demand that the three levels of government fulfil the signed agreement: The San Andrés Accords, signed by the federal government in the year 1996, for indigenous rights and culture.
Because we are not leaving here, we want to remain what we are, we are indigenous. Even though they have are determined 
to displace us, as they did last February 2, 2011 at the entrance to the ecotourism centre at the Agua Azul waterfalls in Chiapas, there currently exists an amparo[ii],number 274/2011, awaiting resolution, for this unjust dispossession, in complicity with the authorities of various agencies and the official ejidal authorities of San Sebastián Bachajón, who tried to alter the ejidal documents so as to give away our lands.
Those who are doing such acts are ejidatarios themselves, through political party ambition, the PRD, PAN, PRI, PVEM, we as victims continue to suffer injustice from the bad governments, through ignorance and lack of awareness they are handing over our lands into the hands of the bad government .
For a year we have respected the legal process under our amparo 274/2011 in the charge of the Seventh District Court in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Chiapas. The facts demonstrate with documents the illegality of what is being done unjustly on ejido lands, we have objected on various occasions when CONAP was altering the coordinates of the 1980 decree.
Currently our amparo has not been determined by the authorities in charge, the constitutional hearing is on January 18, 2013, they are bypassing their own laws. Because the amparo no. 274/2011 highlights the theft of our lands we are very clear about what the bad government intends to do to us, as indigenous peoples.
From all this, we reaffirm our commitment to struggle with the compañer@s of the national and international Other Campaign, that we are ready, since we are ejidatarios adherent to the Other Campaign, to try alternative ways of struggle, we are going to take our first step in building the road to autonomy without losing our identity, from below and to the left, because we are not going to allow them to continue violating our rights, we are now fed up with the authorities continuing to intimidate us for defending our mother earth, which is the only offence for which we are being persecuted.
Enough of injustice, repression, unjust imprisonment and dispossession. We will follow the path of building alternative ways of struggle in our communities. This is the hope that we have, the path that our Zapatista brothers and sisters taught us to follow.
Together we can build a possible world.
Brothers and sisters, our combative greetings.
From the north of Chiapas, Mexico.
Adherents to the Other Campaign of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle.
Sincerely
Land and Freedom
General Coordinator of the Other Campaign
[i] This echoes the recent EZLN communiqué
[ii] An order for legal protection, here perhaps a protective injunction pending resolution of the case.
*******************************************************************************
Judge to Decide Today on Legal Protection for Ejidatarios against the Taking of their Lands in Chilón
** They accuse the Chiapas government of attempting to control access to the Agua Azul Waterfalls
** There is no record of an expropriation decree or of a “donation,” lawyers point out
By: Hermann Bellinghausen, 9th November 2012
Ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, in Chilón, Chiapas, are awaiting this Friday the resolution by a district judge in Tuxtla Gutiérrez for the restitution of lands alienated by the state government, which the indigenous consider to have been taken without legal basis.
The constitutional hearing will have to resolve amparo case number 274/ 2011, filed by the ejido owners of the Other Campaignfor the taking away of part of their land by diverse state and federal authorities, “with the complicity of the ejidal commissioner Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, in order to control the access to the Agua Azul Waterfalls ecotourist centre (Tumbalá municipality), and to fragment their [Other Campaign] organization.”
According to the lawyer for the ejido owners, Ricardo Lagunes, “the authorities have sought to justify their acts in diverse and contradictory ways,” arguing that the acts “are being executed on a general roadway under federal administration; that the surface area was ‘donated’ to the state government by the ejido owners, and that it is inside the Agua Azul Waterfalls Natural Protected Area (ANP, its initials in Spanish), according to the April 29, 1980 decree, and that the surface area was donated by the general assembly of the ejidos of San Sebastián Bachajón and its neighbor Agua Azul.”
Contradicting each argument, Lagunes points out: “We’re not dealing with a general roadway, because neither the National Agrarian Registry (RAN, its initials in Spanish), nor the Agrarian Reform Ministry, nor the Official Journal of the Federation have informed the judge that there is proof of an expropriation decree for the road or that it was donated by the ejido for such purpose. The ejidatarios who ‘donated’ the land to the state government, by not having full ownership, according to the RAN, would not be able to donate to a third party.” The road at issue, four kilometres in length, leads to the Agua Azul River through San Sebastián; the spa resort is in the neighboring ejido, which has charged a toll for years.
The regulations of common use of these lands, ratified through an act of the ejidal assembly in December 2004, makes “the ‘donation’ null and fraudulent, as an independent expert from an UNAM interdisciplinary team confirms. It determined that the affected surface area is not inside the ANP.” Besides, the official plan exhibited by the National Commission for Natural Protected Areas (Conanp) “was altered in its coordinates so that it would include the surface area under litigation, and is therefore not valid.” Nor does an act of the ejidal assembly exist inscribed in the RAN about the alleged donation to the government. The state Secretary of Government and the officialist (pro-government) commissioner of San Sebastián exhibited before the judge an act signed only by this commissioner and some community authorities, “but its validity was challenged because of evident irregularities and because of violations of the requirements of the Agrarian Law.”
The agrarian injunction (amparo), promoted on March 3, 2011, requested “the official suspension of the acts complained of because of dealing with collective agrarian rights.” The judge admitted the demand, but denied the suspension. The demand for guarantees has been extended twice: the first against the Attorney General of the Republic, the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources and the Conanp; and the second against the State Human Rights Council for emitting an unfounded precautionary measure that led to a new violent eviction in Bachajón by the state preventive police last June 19.
With respect to the act exhibited by the Agua Azul residents, the San Sebastián ejidatarios challenge its validity since “reassessing the government’s reports, Agua Azul is an irregular settlement, it does not have title to the land or plans that mark off its possession, as the reports of the RAN and the Yajalón Public Registry of Property have corroborated.” Besides, it was shown that the surface area in question “is located in the area of the San Sebastián land grant and therefore is found inside its (SSB) territory.”
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Friday, November 9, 2012
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2012/11/09/politica/018n1pol
****************************************************************************
New denuncia from San Sebastián Bachajón
July 4, 2012
In a communiqué published on 4 July, ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón who are adherents to the Other Campaign strongly challenged the State Council on Human Rights (CEDH), accusing that “The only thing it does is legitimate the dirty work to impose a megaproject in our lands by means of public force, thus violating also the authority of the ejido. The representatives of this organization are simply puppets of Juan Sabines who is now filling his pockets while the people are repressed, their lands taken from them.”
The ejidatarios denounced the pressure exercised by the CEDH when, as in February following a confrontation, “they were having us think that the solution to the conflict was to integrate us into the convention that the state government has elaborated, but they acted as though there had been no human-rights violations.” They indicate in the same communiqué that on 19 June, hundreds of police “violently displaced ejidatarios who are adherents to the Other Campaign on the orders of the CEDH.”
Finally, they found responsible the CEDH together with the ‘officialist’ ejidatarios for any possible confrontations having to do with the dispute over the control-point at the entrance of the Agua Azul cascades, noting that “Our organization is not responsible and we have demonstrated that on several occasions it is not we who provoke but rather the government in complicity with officialist authorities who seek to transfer our lands into the hands of the government, for its transnational projects.”
********************************************************************************
Analysis of the Criminalization of the San Sebastián Bachajón Region
** The Network against Repression and We Are Not Everyone carry out the study
** The objective is to open the way for tourist megaprojects, they say
[Another example of the violation of the human rights of residents of San Sebastián Bachajón is the case of the indigenous Tzeltals Juan Aguilar Guzmán, Jerónimo Guzmán Méndez, Domingo García Gómez and Domingo Pérez Álvaro, who from February to July 2011 were prisoners in the Playas de Catazajá state prison, where they were victims of attacks and intimidation Photo: Moysés Zúñiga Santiago]
Hermann Bellinghausen
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, July 7, 2012
Faced with repeated denunciations from the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido (Chilón municipality) against the injustice, impunity and human rights violations that their residents suffer because of actions “of the three levels of government,” theNetwork against Repression and for Solidarity in Chiapas and the We Are Not Everyone work group, both adherents (as are the ejido owners) to the Other Campaign, added themselves “to the bellyful” of the communities and documented “the geopolitical importance of this space for the dynamic of capital within a context of a war of attrition” while analyzing “the speculation and criminalization in the region.”
They state that three members from the ejido “unjustly” remain prisoners: Antonio Estrada Estrada (in the Playas de Catazajá prison), Miguel Vázquez Deara (in Ocosingo) and Manuel Demeza Jiménez (in El Amate), victims of a “recurring political-police tactic” of counter-insurgency. The collectives emphasize “the level of torture, harassment and threats prior to their imprisonment.” As they seek to open a way for “tourist megaprojects,” “the ‘uncomfortable enemy’ is punished with legal tools that criminalize dignity and resistance to protect economic interests.”
San Sebastián, in the San José en Rebeldía autonomous Zapatista region, is the access to the Agua Azul Cascades. The Network against Repression denounces: “a mechanism of territorial control by the State” to confine resources (land, water, biodiversity, cultural knowledge) in “security capsules,” like those that are named areas for the protection of flora and fauna, “a mirror of the evaluation of nature for genetic wealth, carbon capture, abundance of water and tourist potential.”
According to the report, the tourist project dates from 20 years ago, as an “object of financial speculation for the consortiums of hotel owners.” The proposal was “to compete with Cancun” with an integrally planned centre. The project was disrupted after the Uprising of the Zapatista National Liberation Army, or EZLN, in 1994, which in order to apply its revolutionary agrarian law and create autonomous municipalities defined “the geographic configuration of the Zapatista resistance.” In 2008, by adopting la Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, more than 1,800 non-Zapatista ejido owners decided to control the ticket booth that the pro-government Agua Azulejido was monopolizing, and thus exercise “the right to the use and enjoyment of their territory.”
In March of 2008, the Norton Consulting and EDSA Construction companies, “complying with the Mesoamerica Project, presented a proposal to ‘boost the economy based on tourism in the jungle of Chiapas.’ Their plans identified spaces and projects which exalt the tourist offering.” It would promote “a hotel chain that manages the concept of lounge/retreat for converting the cascades into one of ‘the most special resort experiences in the Western hemisphere.’ There would be a hotel, a conference centre and golf course.” The operators being considered for the investment are Luxury Collection, Oriente Express and Aman, who all manage room rates between 300 and 1,000 dollars per night (3,800 to 10,800 pesos). Among the hotel corporations mentioned Sonesta, Barceló, Sol Melia, Camino Real, Posadas, Marriot, Hyatt and Westin stand out.
The federal government promotes the strategy starting with the National Fund for Tourism, in collaboration with the Chiapas and federal Secretaries of Tourism, the Secretaries of Foreign Relations and Communications and Transportation, the Federal Prosecutor for Environmental Protection and the National Institute of Anthropology and History.
_______________________________________________________
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Sunday, July 8, 2012
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2012/07/08/politica/019n1pol
********************************************************************************
Tzeltals Question the Actions of the Chiapas Human Rights Council
** They act “under the orders of the corrupt state authorities,” say the ejidatarios
** They requested the eviction of the indigenous who recuperated the Agua Azul ticket booth, they say
By: Hermann Bellinghausen,
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, July 6, 2012
The Tzeltal ejido owners of San Sebastián Bachajón (municipality of Chilón), adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, maintain they have been victims of the injustice of different agencies, and they seriously question the actions of the State Human Rights Council (CEDH, its initials in Spanish) regarding the eviction carried out on June 19 by state police in theejido, after the indigenous belonging to the Other Campaign had recuperated, fleetingly, the ticket booth at the access to the Agua Azul Cascades.
“This is one more piece of evidence of how institutions like the CEDH are speeding up the violence,” the ejido owners say, and they reproach the state council for taking advantage “of the simple fact of being a little familiar with the path of suffering of the indigenous,” because previously members of the governmental organisation “were accompanying us.” They did it “to become acquainted with, and later take as an object of value,” something that to them “has become a business.”
The CEDH, they say, is an “intermediary of transnational projects, a generator of violence, the bad government’s ladder;” on various occasions, they add, “that is what the organizations have shown us.”
They recall that “during the violence and unjust incarceration of our compañeros, the CEDH has always been stalking its victim, trying to make us understand that the solution to the conflict was to enter into an agreement that the government elaborated, but they failed to convince us.” When repression was stirred up against ejido owners of the Other Campaign on February 2, 2011, members of the CEDH “were absent, as if there were no human rights violations anywhere.” They act, the ejido owners assert, “under orders from the corrupt state authorities.”
Last June 19, “800 preventive police violently evicted ejido owners of the Other Campaign because of an eviction order requested by the CEDH, following a petition from Francisco Guzmán Jiménez (Goyito) and the lawyer Héctor Manuel Velasco Santiago, private secretary to the Secretary General of the State Government, Noé Castañón León.” The argument of the police was “a possible confrontation between ejido members.” But about what? they ask: “The only ones that assembled were civilians dressed as police who were hanging out with the ‘preventives’ to show ‘who is leading the Movement.’”
The CEDH “violates its own laws when it orders public security to enter our lands to evict those who defend the land from governmental plunder.” With that “it legitimizes the dirty job of imposing the megaproject in our lands by means of public force, also violating theejido’s protective order (amparo).” The ejido owners consider the organisation’s representatives “puppets of the governor, who for now are lining their pockets while they repress the people and take away the land from which they live.” They place responsibility “on this institution for any possible confrontations.”
And they warn: “We have demonstrated on various occasions that we are not the ones who do the provoking, but rather [it is] the government in complicity with “officialist” (pro-government or anti-Zapatista) authorities from the ejido, who seek to deliver our lands into the hands of the state government for its transnational projects. We are going to defend our lands, we want to continue being the people who we are in the place where we were born, because we are not leaving here.”
________________________________________________________________
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Saturday, July 7, 2012
En español: http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2012/07/07/politica/017n1pol
********************************************************************************
The struggle for territory in San Sebastián Bachajón is once again met with repression
Desinformemonos: Americas Program Original Translation by David Feldman, Jul 3, 2012
The indigenous peoples of San Sebastián Bachajón once again tried to exercise their rights over their territory by taking back the ticket booth at the Agua Azul waterfalls; the government’s response was the same as always: repression and paramilitaries.
Chiapas, México. This past June 19, members of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacondón Jungle (SDSL in Spanish) of the San Sebastián Bachajón Ejido (SSB) in Chiapas took back the Agua Azul Waterfalls ticket booth. The response from the government of Juan Sabines’ Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) was the same as always: a violent and repressive removal and a flagrant violation of the human and collective rights of the members of the San Sebastián Bachajón cooperative.
Taking back what is legitimately theirs, and solidarity with national demands
During the early morning of this past June 19, members of San Sebastián Bachajón, tired of suffering so much injustice, entered the “Agua Azul Waterfalls” complex to take back the ticket booth located at the entrance. As a native Tzetzal village in the region, the booth rightfully and legitimately belongs to them, but Juan Sabines’ government in Chiapas took it from them on February 2, 2011. At the same time, the members set up a roadblock near Agua Azul, where they distributed flyers and demanded the release of three political prisoners from the San Sebastián Bachajón cooperative, as well as the immediate release of Alberto Patishtán Gómez and the Zapatista Francisco Sántiz López. This action took place within the framework of a disjointed national and international action called for June 19, with the goal of demanding the release of Alberto Patishtán Gómez—on the twelfth anniversary of his detention—and the rest of the political prisoners in the country.
One of the San Sebastián Bachajón cooperative’s spokespeople explained during the mobilization: “This current movement is part of a process that we are carrying out to take back a part of the cooperative’s land, which the government has been trying to violently strip us of since last February 2. And so we as organizations and members of the San Sebastián Bachajón cooperative want to retake this piece of land that Juan Sabines’ government wants to take away from us.
Another violent removal under Juan Sabines’ PRD government
Hours later, at approximately six-thirty in the morning, the scene around the entrance to Agua Azul was very different. Twelve trucks carrying 800 state police troopers arrived, directed by the cooperative’s former commissioner, Manuel Jiménez, identified by the members as the main informant and collaborator with Juan Sabines’ government and the secretary of government, Noé Castañon. According to reporters present, they used excessive violence to forcibly remove the members, beating women and men, causing bodily harm and leaving “bruises everywhere.” Two people needed medical attention to treat injuries resulting from the beatings.
No respect for the current protection: one more rights violation
The spokesperson for San Sebastián Bachajón admits that those affected by the removal were surprised by the attitude of Juan Sabines’ government. “They removed us violently. The only thing that we wanted was to take back the part of the land that the state government is stripping us of, and to keep its plans for the transnational project from gaining strength. There is a document from 2010 that states that nearly a hectare of land was donated to the organization. And in 2011, Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, the cooperative’s current commissioner, gave it to the governor of the state.”
The Bachajón spokesperson is referencing protection 274/2011, which was promoted by the members of San Sebastián Bachajón—who were advised by the Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Center for Human Rights—to defend the territory that belongs to them and houses the ticket booth. The request for protection is being processed, but for some reason it is taking longer than normal and there still hasn’t been a response. Nonetheless, under the protection there shouldn’t be any police presence in the area. There is information that says that the operation was ordered by Noé Castañón, at the request of Francisco Guzmán Jiménez. “The governor of the state, with the aid of the secretary of government, Noé Castañon, are above the law, and so they are ignoring the ruling. They are also not respecting the laws that they themselves have passed. We the indigenous people are demanding our rights as cooperative members,” says the spokesperson.
A little context
The cooperative—a plot of communally owned land—is located in the center of the jungle region in Chiapas, an official municipality of Chilón in the autonomous Zapatista region of San José en Rebeldía. It is home to some of the most beautiful natural landscapes in the world: the Agua Azul Waterfalls. A tourism complex has been built at Agua Azul, and has been the target of financial speculation by large hotel consortia for more than 20 years. Ever since the six-year presidential term of Carlos Salinas, government authorities have raised their expectations to convert the Agua Azul Waterfalls into the center/nucleus of a tourist corridor to compete with Cancun: the Fully Planned Center-Agua Azul Waterfalls (CIP-CAA in Spanish). Today, the CIP-CAA is linked to the Mundo Maya tourism project, which brings together Central American and Mexican investors and governments in their quest to speculate even with the last of the land still belonging to the indigenous peoples of Mesoamerica, who have protected them for centuries.
Defending the jungle means defending life itself
Ever since 2008, the members of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle of the San Sebastián Bachajón Cooperative have been fighting tirelessly. Their struggle is one to defend their legitimate and recognized right, as an indigenous tzetzal people, for free determination on the territory where they live, for the land and resources. The members are opposed to the state and federal governments’ strategy of removing them from the territory where the Agua Azul Waterfalls are located for economic reasons having to do with the great touristic potential of the region. But the members of the cooperative aren’t “simply” defending the territory in order to survive as families and villages; given the magnitude of the foreseeable impact of the tourism project, the struggle of the members of Bachajón represents an important defense against the irreversible destruction of the jungle itself and the biodiversity that exists in Chiapas.
Taking back the booth
In 2008, the members took back the ticket booth at the entrance of the Agua Azul tourism complex. According to the members of Bachajón, the booth generated income for 2 thousand families in 192 communities. It represented a step towards the fulfillment of the goals of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the ILO’s Convention 1691, since both international agreements stipulate that natural resources must benefit the indigenous people themselves, and that the income generated serve to strengthen their own political, cultural and economic institutions.
However, the act of taking back the booth has had serious consequences for the members of San Sebastián Bachajón, as Juan Sabines’ government has violently stripped them of the booth on multiple occasions. On February 2, 2011, party members paid and co-opted by the state government provoked a clash which resulted in the arbitrary detention of 117 people, and the ticket booth being removed. Some of those who were detained on that day spent more than 5 months in prison. And so the mobilization this past June 19 to take back the ticket booth occurred a year and a half after it was taken from them. At the same time, the aforementioned request for protection is ongoing, but there has still been no response.
Violence is becoming a part of daily life for the inhabitants of the region
While there are plans for expanding the tourism industry in Chiapas, paradoxically promoted as “ecotourism,” the policy of Juan Sabines’ government is causing a lot of suffering and—perhaps irreversible—damage to the social fabric of the region. Repeated arbitrary detentions, forced disappearances, the extensive use of torture, daily threats, attacks carried out by the paramilitary organizations Opddic and Uciaf and people affiliated with the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) and the Ecologist Green Party of Mexico (PVEM) have been serious. The region is turning into a veritable “red flag” signalling the intensity of the repression in Chiapas2.
Then there are the political prisoners Antonio Estrada (in the Center for Social Rehabilitation –CERSS—17), Miguel Vázquez (in CERSS 16) and Miguel Demeza (CERSS 14), with fabricated charges against them. This past May 10, members of the paramilitary group Uciaf and militants of the PRI and the Green party carried out an armed ambush on the residents of San Sebastián Bachajón, leaving the minor Javier Pérez Jiménez in serious condition3. While there is violent repression against those opposed to the financial plans, the government is also implementing economic assistance programs. This is the counterinsurgency strategy that was developed once the Secretary of National Defense’s (Sedena) 1994 Campaign Plan was implemented in all of Chiapas. It would seem like this is a never-ending story. With the elections only 1 month away, the PRD and Juan Sabines Guerrero are attempting to clear the territory so that their colleagues can continue with the policy of wealth accumulation at the cost of the future of the indigenous peoples and mother earth.
1. United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (articles 4 and 20). ILO Convention 169 (articles 14.1 and 15.1)
2. The attacks carried out by the paramilitary groups and the government repression have been documented since 2008 by various media and statements and reports by the Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Center For Human Rights. For more recent information, refer to Paramilitares atacan a ejidatarios de San Sebastián Bachajón; uno agoniza, dicen, Bellinghausen, Herman. 1May 11, 2012. http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2012/05/11/politica/016n1pol [1]; or the Informe Especial: Gobierno crea y administra conflictos para el control territorial en Chiapas, Centro de Derechos Humanos Fray Bartolomé de las Casas,http://www.frayba.org.mx/archivo/informes/110303_informe_territorio_bachajon.pdf
3. Ibid
********************************************************************************
Ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón reclaim the toll booth at Agua Azul
At this moment : The ejidatarios of San Sebastian Bachajón, adherents to the Other Campaign, have just recuperated the toll booth at Agua Azul, as part of the national and international movement for the release of the political prisoners. The taking of the booth and the blocking of the road are to demand the release of the political prisoners Alberto Patishtán, who is currently unjustly serving 12 years in prison, the compañerosupport base Francisco Sántiz Lopez, the three prisoners from Bachajón (Antonio Estrada Estrada, Miguel Vásquez Deara and Miguel Demeza Jimenez), as well as the other political prisoners, prisoners of conscience and those imprisoned unjustly in Chiapas. In addition, the taking [of the booth] is another chapter in the struggle for the defence of land and territory against the mega-tourism projects [planned] for the region, for the communities in resistance consider these to be projects of dispossession and death.
11.00 PRIista “shock” groups meeting at the crossroads to the waterfalls
12.00 A helicopter flies low over Agua Azul and meets with the PRIistas.
Paramilitaries Attack San Sebastián Bachajón ejido Members; they say one man is dying
** Adherents of the Other Campaign place responsibility on Uciaf members for the aggressions
**They warn residents that faced with the inattention of the authorities they will take matters into their own hands
by: Hermann Bellinghausen
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, May 10, 2012
Members of the Indigenous and Forest Campesino Union (Unión Campesina Indígena y Forestal, Uciaf, its initials in Spanish), affiliated with the Green Ecologist and Revolutionary Institucional (PRI) parties, ambushed residents of San Sebastián Bachajón ejido with firearms, leaving Javier Pérez Jiménez, 17, very badly injured; according to ejidatarios of the Other Campaign, “he is dying in theHospital de las Culturas” in this city.
The attack, which occurred last Sunday on the stretch of highway between Chilón-Carmen Xaquila, was led by Víctor Manuel Vázquez López, a native of San José Chapapuyil (all of these in Chilón municipality) and representative of Uciaf, an organization which before, under the name of ‘Development Peace and Justice’ (Desarrollo Paz y Justicia), was the paramilitary scourge of the state’s northern zone at the end of the last decade. The other three attackers have not been identified.
The Other Campaign ejido members denounced today that in the village of San Jose, “a group of 12 people exists, led by Manuel Vázquez Ruiz, director of the Uciaf,” with a background of participating “in several violent acts, and who are currently members of the PRI-Green Ecologist parties”. They are identified as “the principal agitators of society in that village, a product of the intense campaigns of those political parties, which have encouraged different violent acts.”
Javier and his oldest brother, who was unhurt, “were heading to their homes when suddenly, without knowing the motives, four strongly armed individuals came out from among the weeds and shot at them in cold blood.”
In a previous act, on April 29, 2011 the same Vázquez López attacked Florentino Pérez Gómez with a steel weapon (knife) and “he had the sad experience of losing some parts of his body, which up until now he has preserved in a glass container”, state the indigenous. There is an arrest warrant for this for Vázquez López and those responsible, which the authorities have ignored.
Pérez Gómez “should have had the opportunity to be able to demand justice for what happened to him, but it never came,” explain those making the denuncia. “As they are people of few resources, one day they went to the offices of the state attorney general of justice, in Yajalón, for the purpose of requesting the cooperation of the authorities in executing the arrest warrant against those responsible”. To their surprise, these authorities told the indigenous man’s family “that to go to arrest the one responsible they needed 6, 000 pesos”, and that “justice costs money”.
The Tzeltal ejido members designate as “principally responsible” for this violence “the law enforcement authorities”. They warn: “We are not going to continue to tolerate more repression and attacks by party members”, and conclude: “It is very clear who is responsible; if the competent authority does not take action in this matter we are going to do it [ourselves], because it is not the first time that we have been victims of injustice with the sole purpose of breaking up our organization and intimidating us into not continuing our struggle in defence of our lands and territories. This is one more example of how the political parties are generating violence, confrontation and disintegration with their projects.”
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Friday, May 11, 2012
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2012/05/11/politica/016n1pol
**********************************************************************
Two ejidatarios are ambushed in San Sebastian Bachajón
In a communiqué released on 10 May, 2012, ejidatarios from San Sebastián Bachajón who are adherents to the “Other Campaign” denounced that on 6 May, members of the Indigenous Campesino and Forest Union (Uciaf) who are affiliated with the Green Ecologist (PVEM) and the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) used firearms in an ambush of two residents of the ejido, leaving Javier Pérez Jiménez gravely injured, being 17 years of age. He is now suffering in a hospital in San Cristóbal de Las Casas. His brother, also present, survived the attack without injury and identified one of the four aggressors as Manuel Vázquez Ruíz, leader of Uciaf, and one of the “principal agitators of the society of this community, a product of the intense campaigns taken by these political parties which have caused several violent incidents.”
They indicated furthermore that in a previous event on 29 April 2011, the same Vázquez López fired on Florentino Pérez Gómez and that “there exists in this sense an arrest-order against Vázquez López and those who are responsible, regarding whom the authorities have been negligent.” They noted that Pérez Gómez “had the opportunity to be able to demand justice for what had happened to him, but this never arrived. As they are people with few resources, one day they came to the offices of the State Attorney General’s Office in Yajalón toward the end of soliciting aid from the authorities to request an arrest-order against those responsible. To their surprise, these authorities said to the indigenous family that to go arrest the responsible would require 6,000 pesos, insisting that justice requires money.” This is the reason for which the communiqué identified as principally responsible for the violence in the zone the authorities supposedly imparting justice.
They warned also that “It is very clear who it is that is responsible; if the relevant authorities do not take on this affair we will do it ourselves, because this is not the first time that we have been victims of injustice that seeks only to degrade our organization and intimidate us so that we give up our struggles for defence of territory and land. This is yet another example of how the political parties are generating violence, confrontations, and social alienation with their projects.”
********************************************************************************
Tourist Projects Cause of Persecution of Other Campaign Adherents, they assert
** Ejido members in San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, will present evidence of repression
by: Hermann Bellinghausen
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, May 4, 2012
Ejido members of the Other Campaign in San Sebastián Bachajón (Chilón municipality) have decided to present “evidence of how authorities from the three levels of government and their communication media manipulate the true situation of repression.” They consider that the state and federal governments deliver a “covert counterinsurgency war against indigenous peoples.”
Faced with “so many rights violations in different areas against defenders and social strugglers, because of their defence of our mother earth,” they stress that: “the repressor government controls justice as it pleases, to use in revenge against those who resist its transnational projects.” Dozens of ejido members have been imprisoned between 2009 and 2011. On 3rd February 2011 alone, the police detained 117 of them at the same time. Most have been Other Campaignadherents, but some are also Zapatista support bases.
Having come to the decision “because of the acts of the bad government,” they are undertaking “a re-encounter with our past to be able to identify the one really responsible for all the injustices that are committed day after day in our village; of how the bad government had a lot to do with the way it was instructing, advising and manipulating people with projects, buying consciences to gain land in the control of territory in each village and community, to manage society as it wished.”
In recent days, the Tzeltal ejido members began to release a series of collective testimonies wherein they outline their resistance, which continues under constant threat, and they have three compañeros still in prison. People in San Sebastian Bachajón, located in the coveted Agua Azul region, are “a people very dignified in their traditions.” Previously “the respect we gave to each other was not only crucial, it came from our ancestors, from the belief of our Maya forefathers in the reverence and respect for Mother Earth: caves, hills, natural springs, and the sacred nature of sowing and planting.” As for religion, “the religious sects were not much like they are now.”
Before, they were governed by usages and customs. “Now that laws exist, there is a lot of insecurity in the villages and the communities because the law is not made for us, the poor, but for those ‘who have’, the big rich landowners; the policy of the political parties is transforming time, breaking up the people after our ancestors made their revolution”.
The War of Conquest “seems like history.” In reality, they explain, “the new hidden war is a conquest for territorial control of the natural resources, invasion and the ambition of the politicians who want to take possession of our culture and our people, politicians who hold on violently to obtain what they want, regardless of the human costs they leave during their passage in the elections.”
For reasons of territorial contiguity, family and political sympathy, they have shared fortunes and misfortunes with the region’s Zapatista communities, particularly those that are part of the Comandanta Ramona autonomous municipality.
The ejido was organized until 2007 in the independent (eventually PRD) grouping of Yomblej; in 2008 the majority adhered to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandón Jungle, and the Other Campaign, in order to defend their territorial rights, including [rights to] a ticket booth at the entrance (almost all through the ejido) giving access to the Agua Azul Waterfalls in the neighbouring municipality of Tumbalá. The state government’s interference has been direct and from the highest level, as well as from the Green Ecologist and PRI parties, which welcome into their ranks members of known paramilitary groups. The region has plans for tourist megaprojects and for a super highway, which are repeatedly pointed to as the real cause of the persecution against the Other Campaign in San Sebastián Bachajón.
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Saturday, May 5, 2012
San Sebastián Bachajón Ejido Members Report Constant Harassment
** They state that they daily suffer arbitrary detentions, torture and imprisonment ** They believe the motive is their defence of their territory and their resistance to tourism and highway plans
by Hermann Bellinghausen
San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas, May 3, 2012
Arbitrary detentions, torture and incarceration of ejido members from San Sebastián Bachajón (municipality of Chilón) have become commonplace. Since August they have happened on repeated occasions (La Jornada 26, 28 & 30 of April), although this pattern has been developing since 2010.
When elections are approaching, the ejido owners maintain, “the government changes strategy; if they have distributed projects, productive support and ‘conditional’ programmes, with the constant intervention of political operators,” now it is done through the parties on [electoral] campaign. They specifically accuse the Green Ecologist [Party], the PRI and the Colosio Foundation of this, though also the PAN and the PRD.
In an extensive statement about the attacks and unfounded accusations that they have received from the state government since 2007, as a result of defending their territory and resisting plans for transnational tourism and highways on their lands, the San Sebastián ejido members reveal “evidence of how the bad government criminalizes the Other Campaign and those engaged in social struggles in defence of Mother Earth, with the objective of breaking up the organization[s].”
The most recent case occurred on April 22, when preventive police detained Samuel Jiménez Álvaro “for an alleged crime of aggravated attempted murder, according to the criminal case 276/2011.” He was released after being tortured for three days. His other compañeros didn’t have the same luck and are in prison on different charges, as yet not accredited.
Another illegal detention occurred on the night of September 26, 2011, when around 100 members of the State Preventive Police violently searched the residence of former political prisoner Juan Aguilar Guzmán, without a search warrant. “They fired shots inside the house without regard for the minors who were at that time were resting [there].” They found nothing, but they took Jerónimo Aguilar Espinoza to an unknown location. The police interrogated him repeatedly about “the name of the Other Campaign leader, how many there are and where they are.” He was released hours later.
The parties, meanwhile, “use our names to win elections manipulating the women that receive the Opportunities Programme.” This happens “to break us up, but we continue resisting and struggling without worrying about the consequences. We are the ones who love our Mother Earth. Is it a crime to defend her?”
The Tzeltal ejido members say they are “tired” of the human rights violations, and “that the authorities are above the laws and our rights as indigenous peoples.” They invite other organizations to raise their voices, “because it’s not just happening in San Sebastián, but also in different places in Chiapas and México.”
In implementing the government strategy, “different actors have been involved in its design and operation.” The indigenous have testimony about “the direct participation of different characters in the policy.” One of them is Noé Castañón León, Secretary General of Government. They cite information from witnesses, “whose identity is protected due to the risk to their lives and personal integrity” about a plan of dispossession and plunder “developed under the argument of the land management.”
The official met last year with Carmen Aguilar Gómez, an instrument of the official strategy, who “was already dismissed from his position in the ejido, and in a few days was integrated with the government in the plan to continue managing lands.” He never achieved this, and “he ended up sacrificing innocent people at Rancho El Vergel, Sitalá municipality.” The indigenous outline “the most relevant events, which help to explain the permanent intervention by the three levels of government in order to confront and polarize the zone.” This is without mentioning numerous “local” happenings in the communities or “the physical attacks by the PVEM and the PRI.”
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Friday, May 4, 2012
********************************************************************************
Statement from RvsR Chiapas about the repression of the compañeros from San Sebastian Bachajón
San Cristobal de Las Casas, Chiapas, May 4, 2012
Compañeros and compañeras of the Other Campaign (National and International)
We have received three reports from the compañeros from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, in which they have shared some of their history and their resistance, especially the injustice, impunity and human rights violations by the three levels of government. As the Network against Repression and for Solidarity in Chiapas and the Working Group No Estamos Todxs, we share the feelings of having had enough, and consider it very important not to take our finger off the pulse of the geopolitical significance that represents the space for the dynamics of capital within the context of a war of attrition. That is, let us briefly analyse together the speculation and criminalization in the region in order to join in the defence of land and territory:
The third denuncia from the compañeros briefly summarizes the process of criminalization of the ejidatarios adherent to the Other Campaign. Today three compañeros from the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajon are unjustly imprisoned in the jails of el Amate, Ocosingo and Catazajá, due to the recurring political-policing tactics designed as part of the Counterinsurgency War. The level of torture, harassment and threats prior to their imprisonment indicates the well-known instrumentation of state repression. This action contextualized in the area allows the continuation of tourist megaprojects, which require “uncomfortable punishment of the enemy” with legal tools to criminalize dignity and resistance, in order to protect economic interests and allow them to concentrate profits in a few hands.
The ejido San Sebastián Bachajón is located in the centre of the Chiapas jungle (selva), in the official municipality of Chilón, Zapatista Autonomous Region San José en Rebeldía, a strategic location for accumulation by dispossession (Harvey, 2006), the site of one of the most beautiful natural landscapes in the world: the waterfalls of Agua Azul. It is noteworthy that a mechanism of territorial control by the state which has appeared in the area in the last thirteen years is the encapsulation of the “strategic resources” (land, water, biodiversity in flora and fauna, cultural knowledge, etc.). in ”backup capsules” like those which state institutions locate and designate as Protected Wildlife Areas (APFyF). These reflect the value placed on nature, in consideration of its genetic diversity, its ability to capture carbon, the abundance of water and its tourism potential, as in the case of the “Agua Azul Waterfalls Biosphere Reserve”, which are resulting from this strategy of grabbing land, making the demagogy of “eco-tourism” which the bad government of Juan Sabines promotes simply absurd.
The tourist resort complex has for 20 years been the subject of financial speculation by large hotel groups. Carlos Rojas, head of the Ministry of Social Development (SEDESOL) during the Salinas administration, began to paint their dreams in the jungle, only the means of valuing what was stolen was focused on the exploitation of natural landscapes through tourism. The centre point was the Agua Azul waterfalls, with the proposal for a centre to compete with the tourist resort of Cancun: the Integrally Planned Centre-Agua Azul Waterfalls (CIP-CAA).However, the project was derailed by the EZLN uprising in 1994, which adopted the “revolutionary agrarian law”, later, the creation of the Rebel Zapatista Autonomous Municipalities enabled the geographical reconfiguration of the Zapatista resistance. Recalling part of the proposal of the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, in 2008 over 1800 ejidatarios who are adherents to the Other Campaign, exercising their right to use and enjoy their territory, decided to manage the toll booth of the tourist complex.
Nevertheless, at the same time, in March 2008, the companies Norton Consulting, Inc. and EDSA Construction, following the Mesoamerican Project (PPP), presented a proposal to “raise the tourism-based economy in the jungle of Chiapas”. The study aimed to develop a strategic plan to identify the areas and projects that could elevate the tourist experience, “more visitors and more expenses”, for what would be the CIPP-CAA. The first stage of this project would be to encourage a hotel chain to develop the concept of “Lodge/retreat” and turn the waterfalls of Agua Azul into one of “the most unique resort experiences that exist in the Western Hemisphere.” Developing four concepts of hotels/resorts in which the most luxurious chains in world tourism could invest: world-class Boutique Hotel, Lodge/retreat -near the Agua Azul Waterfalls-, European type five star hotel, Resort with hotel, Conference Centre and Golf. Operators to be considered for investment are: Luxury Collection, Orient Express, Aman, all of whom operate a room rate of between 300 and 1000 dollars a night (3800 to 10,800 pesos). Of the European hotels, the following stand out: Sonesta, Barcelo, Sol Melia, Kempinsky. Of hotel, conference and Golf complexes: Camino Real, Posadas, Park, Royal, Marriott, Hyatt and Westin.
The federal government’s strategy is presented in a similar way, by the National Fund for Tourism (FONATUR) in collaboration with both state and federal agencies such as the Secretary of Tourism of the State of Chiapas, the Ministry of Tourism and International Relations, the Ministry of Communications and Transport (SCT), the Federal Environmental Protection (PROFEPA), and the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH). It has been clarified that the state government of Chiapas has as its main tasks: a) To promote, establish and operate eight tourist circuits – among these is the circuit Corridor Palenque-Agua Azul waterfalls-Tonina-San Cristobal de las Casas; b) Develop diagnostics and implement environmental policies as a tool to manage land reserves, specifically for the Integrally Planned Centre Palenque-Agua Azul waterfalls, c) Negotiate with the SCT “the construction of the San Cristobal-Palenque highway” as well as expanding and relocating Palenque airport, which will be the transfer route for tourists. As for the municipalities who would participate in implementing the mega project, they must: a) Contribute to the image and architecture of the landscape; b) Widen the public safety coverage in the tourist circuits and areas; c) Provide facilities for obtaining licenses and permits for the development of ecotourism projects.
Criminalization as a state policy, and repression as an instrument of control, as well as patronage, have been made visible in a cynical way from February 2010 until the date when members of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) burst into the Zapatista community of Bolon Ajaw with paramilitary actions and with orders to dislodge and cause the displacement of families. A year later, days before the visit of Felipe Calderón to the tourist area, came the violent eviction of the compañeros from San Sebastían Bachajón; since February 2011, repression, impunity, criminalization, and patronage (characteristic of election times), reveal once again the lies and cheap demagoguery, this time showing the barbarity of Juan Sabines and his deputy Noé Castañón.
The discourse of “sustainability” and/or “responsible tourism” and the supposed “tables of discussion ” which is adopted by the bad government is nothing but a discourse of deception and a scenario of camouflage which today serves the governor, those who act on his orders, and those who do not care about the environmental damage or the speculation on the biodiversity and cultural knowledge that characterise the area. Not only the individuals but also the institutions that promote and manage tourism and are committed to their task are responsible for the criminalization of the compañeros: SEMARNAT, CONANP, INAH have to take care of the estates and land tenure, and to establish criteria and programmes for management and tourist use. FONATUR, will be responsible for developing a Business Plan and Master Plan of the CIPP-CAA and participate in the Tourism Development Programme for of the Jungle Region of the state of Chiapas …
In short, what we present is only a part of the speculative action in the region, hence the political strategies of the federal, state and local governments are not so naive. In the region Juan Sabines and the various political parties (PRI, PAN, PRD, PVEM), are repeating the same policy of instituting assistance programmes, clientelism, cooptation and the criminalization of those who resist, with the aim of generating conflict between communities in the region in order to administer the territory and hand it over to financial and speculative capital.
We realize that the context where the conflict has been sown regarding the management of the toll booth at Agua Azul is a mirror of the dispute between those who sympathize with the interests of grand capital, the multinationals and the mediocre party system, and those who defend the land that gives life and economic, cultural and political livelihood to the indigenous Maya communities, those who build with dignity autonomous alternatives which confront the system of death which is capitalism.
In brief, we share the testimony of three fellow inmates in San Sebastian Bachajon:
Antonio Estrada Estrada, detained at CERSS 17 Playas de Catazaja
Miguel Vazquez Deara, detained at CERSS 16 Ocosingo
Manuel Demeza Jimenez, detained at CERSS 14 El Amate
We demand an end to the repression and harassment against the ejido San Sebastian Bachajon,
as well as the immediate release of the 3 prisoners mentioned above.
Network against Repression and for Solidarity in Chiapas
Working Group No Estamos Todxs
Network against Repression Chiapas
(RvsR-Chiapas)
********************************************************************************
Police accused of torturing two Indigenous members of the “Otra Campaña” in Chiapas
By Hermann Bellinghausen
La Jornada, April 28th, 2012
San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas:
Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Vázquez Deara, members of a Tzeltal ejido (communal agricultural plot) and the “Otra Campaña” (“Other Campaign”), found themselves in prison, suffering severe torture from the police and state judiciary, in order to force them to incriminate themselves as assailants.Their stories were given to La Jornada by their families and uncover the practice of torture and set ups in Chiapas.
Ejido representatives say that they are innocent and consider them “political prisoners” because their families “are very involved in the ‘Otra Campaña.’”Vázquez Deara has been in the Ocosingo prison since last September and Antonio Estrada has been in the Playas de Catazajá prison since August.
Antonio says that on August 7 he was arrested near his home by five hooded agents “and a commander” (as identified by their radio communications). “They covered me with a shirt, handcuffed me, and put me in their paddy wagon, face down, hands behind my back. They asked me if I was the one who had been attacking people and punched me in the ribs. They threatened to shoot me in the head, roll me in a mat, and throw me into a landfill.”On the way to Palenque, they continued to beat him. There he was handed over to “the court,” his hood was removed, “and they immediately slapped me so I wouldn’t see the person, after which they blindfolded me very hard.” He has a 5cm scar in his nasal septum. “They put a bag over my head to suffocate me and I fainted.” They insisted on “a confession.” “When I woke up they put the bag over my head again. Later they put me in a bin full of water, pulled me out, and threw me on the floor where I hit the back of my head. I didn’t know if I’d recover or if I’d die.”
The officers warned him “that barely a quarter of the punishment had been delivered.” After “they covered my nose and mouth with a cloth, held my head back, and poured water on the cloth so when I breathed the water entered my nose and mouth. If I wanted to talk, they told me to move my head and say I was the assailant. I said no, and they continued their punishment. I felt death coming on. I signaled that I wanted to talk as they were hitting me in the head, and I managed to deny it still. The third I couldn’t stand.”When interrogating him about his “accomplices,” Antonio mentioned Santiago and Pascual Gómez Moreno, from Xanil. “It’s well-known in my town that they attack people.” The police brought a search warrant to Santiago’s home. “They took me to Ocosingo” and then to Xanil. “They didn’t find it, they had been tipped off.”
They brought him to the sandbar to show them the location of the assaults. A few days earlier, one had occurred there. He started to deny the crime again. “They started punching me in the stomach and my ears and kicking my backside.” Bound hand and foot, he was blindfolded again and heard officers dragging a trunk into the middle of the road. “At that moment I didn’t realize it because of the blindfold, but when I saw the record, I saw the picture of a white RAM van with its doors open and the license plate covered in masking tape, making it seem like it was attacked; I don’t appear in the picture.” They planted a gun, two knives, and a ski mask.
Back in Palenque, they brought him before the Public Prosecutor (MP). “In the report, the MP and experts had already written a document. They didn’t let me make a statement, they just threatened me that if I didn’t sign they would hit me, so I signed the papers out of fear.”
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Thursday, April 26, 2012
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2012/04/26/politica/023n1pol
Translation by Michael Kane, Americas Program
******************************************************************************
DETENTION AND TORTURE OF OTHER CAMPAIGN ADHERENTS CONTINUES
** Antonio Estrada, Tzeltal, accuses the PRI and PVEM of Chiapas of making unfounded denunciations
** They fabricated the crime of stealing a vehicle on the Ocosingo-Agua Azul Highway, he points out
by Hermann Bellinghausen
Ocosingo, Chiapas, April 27, 2012
Finding themselves isolated from the organized “political prisoners” in some Chiapas prisons, Miguel Vázquez Deara and Antonio Estrada Estrada, Other Campaign adherents from San Sebastián Bachajón ejido, face their imprisonment, which they insist is unfounded, in conditions of great solitude.
Vázquez Deara, secluded in the Ocosingo prison, was detained and tortured, his family members say, “after being pointed out by members of the PRI and the Green Ecologist (Party) who are handing over the ejido to the government.” This is: “because we participate a lot in the Other Campaign.” “During the torture they demanded that he tell them who directs the Other Campaign. He had the responsibility as a member of the community police to stop the many robberies committed by party members, protected by the government.”
On September 25, 2011, Miguel states in his testimony, he boarded transportation to go to Palenque. There was a Public Security checkpoint at the Vicente Guerrero ejido, “where they searched the passengers and they let me pass because going I had my work uniform in a bag, which I showed them.” Another day in Palenque “I went into the street to look for transport, police arrived to watch me and I saw that Juan Álvaro and Manuel Jiménez (from Xanil and Pamalá, respectively) were pointing at me.” I was apprehended “and others who were waiting, when they learned about it arrived at the prison in Playas de Catazajá to accuse me.”
Upon detaining him, the police covered his face with the uniform that he was carrying and stole 150 pesos. “I did not manage to locate where they took me. They were asking me who my ‘robber compañeros’ were, I answered in Tzeltal that I had not done anything, a policeman said to me ‘you talk through your dick,’ and that they were going to prepare ‘a torture.’ I answered that they could do what they wanted to me because I had not done anything. They handcuffed me, covered my mouth and my eyes with a black rag, and completely undressed me. Afterwards, they put a bag over my head, hit my stomach and chest with the butts of guns, and the nape of my neck with their fists.” In custody at Catazajá, he relates, “I shitted blood.”
They continued the torture with the bag over his head. “A patrol car arrived with some saying that they were going to pretend they caught me in the act of stealing.” When night fell, they moved him to Ocosingo. On the journey, arriving in Xanil, he heard “that they would pass through to leave information at Juan Alvaro’s house,” who was not at home. From there they drove Miguel to the Ocosingo preventive prison and confronted him with another detainee. “They asked me whether he was my partner in crime, I responded no. The police hit our heads together. I didn’t stay long there. They put me in the same patrol car.”
Now they accused him of stealing a Nissan “estaquita”. “I told them that I don’t have a car and that I had done nothing, they have never caught me stealing.” He was delivered to judicial agents, who showed him “the weapons that he used for attacking, they gave me two very strong kicks in the butt and I felt that they dislocated my bones.” They obliged him to hold weapons and they photographed him. Afterwards, a federal highway police officer arrived who interrogated him about the whereabouts of a shooting at the ejido’s gravel pit on July 26. “I answered that I don’t know. He demanded that I say that I stole a Nissan with license plates from the DF (federal district). He stayed for two hours there obliging me to say that I stole and that those were my weapons.”
On September 27, at the Indigenous Magistrate’s Office, they obliged him to sign several sheets of paper “without seeing their content.” The office’s lawyer accompanied him in the patrol car to the prison. “There, he said that I assaulted and stole a vehicle on the Ocosingo-Agua Azul stretch of highway. I told him in Tzeltal ‘you are my lawyer, thanks for blaming me for what I did not do and thanks also to those that pointed me out’. That’s how it was that I stayed here as a prisoner.”
________________________________
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Saturday, April 28, 2012
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2012/04/28/politica/017n1pol
******************************************************************************
Indigenous Denounce “Intensive Torture” By Police in Chiapas
** Antonio Estrada and Miguel Vázquez, obliged to confess to robberies
** They have been prisoners in Ocosingo and Catazajá prisons since last year
By: Hermann Bellinghausen,
San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, April 25, 2012
Antonio Estrada Estrada and Miguel Vázquez Deara, residents of this Tzeltal ejido and adherents to the Other Campaign, are prisoners after suffering intensive torture by state preventive and judicial police to oblige them to confess to being robbers.
Their testimony –delivered to La Jornada by their family members– confirms the persistence of the practice of torture and fabrication of crimes in Chiapas. The ejido’s representatives maintain that they are innocent and consider them “political prisoners” because their families “participate a lot in the Other Campaign.”
Vázquez Deara is in prison in Ocosingo since last September, and Antonio Estrada in Playas de Catazajá since August. Antonio relates that last August 7 he was detained near his home by five masked agents “and a commander” (as they identified him by radio). “They put a T-Shirt over my head, handcuffed me and put me in the back of the patrol car, face down and hands behind my back. They were asking me if I was the one that was always robbing, they hit me in the ribs. They threatened to shoot me in the head and wrap me in a mat to throw me in a garbage dump.”
They continued beating him on the way to Palenque. They delivered him to “judicial authorities” there (in Palenque), who uncovered his face and “and immediately gave me a slap on the face me, as to not identify the person, because it obscured my vision, and they blindfolded my eyes very strongly.” He still has a 5-centimeter scar on his nasal wall. “They placed a bag on my head to asphyxiate me and I fainted.” They insisted that I “confess. When I recuperated they put the bag on me again. Afterwards they put me in a tub full of water, they took me out and threw me on the floor, beating me in the back of the head; I didn’t know whether to recuperate or to die.”
The agents warned him that: “the punishment was not even one fourth over, that it was still unfinished.” Later “they put a rag on me covering my nose and mouth, holding it back to let water fall into the rag so that when I would breathe the water would enter my nose and mouth, in case I wanted to talk they told me to move my head to say that I am the robber. I said I wasn’t; they applied punishment to me again. I sensed death. I gave the signal that I wanted to talk while they were hitting my head, and I still achieved denying. I could not endure the third.”
Upon interrogating him about his “accomplices,” Antonio mentioned Santiago and Pascual Gómez Moreno, of Xanil. “It is known in my village that they are indeed dedicated to robbery.” The police announced a search of Santiago’s house. “They took me to Ocosingo” and from there to Xanil. “They did not find him, they had warned him.”
At the gravel pit they took off the blindfold so that he could indicate the place of the robberies. One had occurred there a few days before. He denied it again. “They started to hit me in the stomach and the ears and to kick me in the butt.” His hands and feet chained, they blindfolded him again and he heard the agents drag a tree trunk into the middle of the highway. “At that moment I did not realize because of the blindfold on my eyes, but when I saw the case file I saw the photo of a white RAM truck with the doors open, on which they covered up the number with brown tape, making it appear as though it were stolen; I did not appear in the photo.” They planted a pistol, two machetes and a ski mask on him.
Returning to Palenque, they presented him to the Public Ministry. At the entrance, the specialists had already prepared the document, “they did not ask me for a statement, they only threatened that if I didn’t sign they would beat me, and I signed the papers because of fear.”
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2012/04/26/politica/023n1pol
*******************************************************************************
Statement by RvsR Chiapas for San Sebastian Bachajón
* San Cristobal de Las Casas, April 21, 2012 *
Yesterday, our compañerxs, ejidatarixs from San Sebastian Bachajón, adherents to the Sixth Declaration of the Lacandon Jungle, issued a statement through which they tell the story of their people and the way in which the politicians of the bad government have gone about destroying several aspects of their lives in order to gain territorial control.
Recounting how the situation was before, they tell us that the town was governed by its own customs and traditions, having as authorities the main people who sorted out the affairs of the community. The compañerxs of SSB explained how little by little the situation of their people was getting worse, with the entry of political parties and the government’s willingness to appropriate the natural resources, modifying and creating laws that benefit those from above.
San Sebastian Bachajón is an ejido covering a wide area with a variety of natural resources such as forests, springs, hills, waterfalls, etc. … this land belongs to the Tseltal people, as they are the original inhabitants who have historically lived in this region and have taken care of mother earth. Today, with the aggressive strategy of capitalism, through lies, harassment, imprisonment, manipulation, welfare programmes…. the bad government wants to own these resources, regardless of any violations of human rights that may be necessary. The form of relationship with the natural world that the government proclaims, through its acts of a speculative nature, is one of resource exploitation and never one of care for mother earth.
This is not an isolated story, since for many years colonialist and capitalist governments have conducted a war against the indigenous peoples of Mexico, stripping them
of their territory and culture in order to take over natural resources and obtain large economic benefits from the tourism sector. That is why many communities have been organizing, as is the case of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón, adherent to the Other Campaign, which every day struggles for its right to the land and against the onslaught of the government and the financial system.
Therefore, we pronounce ourselves for respect for the territorial rights of San Sebastian Bachajón and against dispossession and the repression of organized communities.
* Network against Repression and for Solidarity in Chiapas *
* Working Group No Estamos Todxs *
*(RvsR-Chiapas)*
******************************************************************************
Ecotourism Advances in the Chiapas Jungle, Subjecting the Indigenous Population
** They expel from the market those who express criticisms or oppose this practice through resistance
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
Palenque, Chiapas,
March 24, 2012
Ecotourism advances in the Northern Chiapas Jungle and its plans subject the original population –even the urban population– to commercial ends, threatening communal property and self-determination. But those who express criticism or oppose through resistance these new tourist practices, promoted by the authorities and the investors, are expelled from that market, now traditional in the zone. It makes the service providers that are in disagreement not dare to demonstrate this openly.
A flyer is circulating in Palenque, inevitably anonymous, which maintains: “The ‘high’ tourist season conditions the economy to the subjection of slave interests, thus impeding economic stability and choking with credit. Ecotourism is used to buy loyalty, identify opponents and attack them with paramilitaries.”
Ecotourism, publicized as an economic panacea, beneficial to the threatened environment, “is a political-economic-military instrument against indigenous autonomy,” the message adds. “It teaches computer skills and English ‘to civilize’ the farmer and convert him into an employee dependent on a minimum wage. Humiliating amusements, noxious pleasures, insulting stories, contaminated ecosystems and television prophecies are part of the total war against you”.
It is fitting to remember that the Northern Zone of Chiapas has been the scene of recurring paramilitary violence for more than 15 years, above all because of the group of PRI members known as Paz y Justicia, although they periodically change their name and party affiliation. Their members have seasonably been PRD members, and now a significant percentage belong to the Green Ecologist Party of Mexico, to which the PRI seems to have ceded this zone with a view to the next electoral process; the PRI-PVEM’s candidate for governor will be, very probably, the state leader of the Greens.
It is the region for Greens. Not only tourism exercises new pressures against residents of the Northern Jungle, above all in Palenque and its adjacent areas like Salto de Agua, Playas de Catazajá and Ocosingo. The agro-industries for the production of agro-fuels have extended into cattle ranches, plantations farms and ejido lands. Rented or sold, from this municipality to Marqués de Comillas, in the Lacandón Jungle, thousands of hectares were re-converted into African [oil] Palm plantations.
Civil environmental organisations, like Otros Mundos, have documented the “disastrous” mono-cultivation of [oil] palm, widespread in the municipality of Palenque. According to Otros Mundos (October 2011), the Chiapas government obliges campesinos who accept the [productive] reconversion programme “not to cut the oil plant for 25 years,” which “is a way of stealing the land from the ejido owner” who cannot plant foods or breed cattle. “You give your lands and put in your cheap manual labor, the government gives or subsidizes the seedlings, and the corporations take away the profits.”
Plantations of future agro-fuels “eliminate forests, jungles, biodiversity, medicinal plants, flowers and animals, as well as fruits, wood, fibres, meats, honey, mushrooms; they degrade, erode, contaminate and impoverish the soils. They leave ‘green deserts’ whose heat is unbearable for other forms of life.”
Contradicting the happy official accounts on employment matters, Otros Mundos maintains that it does not generate many jobs, “men and women who work in the plant nurseries spend months without pay, without adequate tools, in bad working conditions and without social services.”
The government argues “that the palm will give better living conditions to the indigenous and campesino producers, better income and more jobs; that it is reforesting with the plantations, that it combats climate change, that it recuperates the river basins, that it does not damage the environment.” But productive reconversion and the mono-culture crops of palm “can never be sustainable,” says Otros Mundos.
____________________________________________________
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Sunday, March 25, 2012
Chiapas: Ejidatarios from Bachajon reclaim land
1st December 2011
The community of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Other Campaign, issued a statement on November 30th, in which they inform of the decision taken by the men and women, ejidatarios of the community, to reclaim the toll booth at Agua Azul and the entrance facilities to the tourist eco-centre, taking into consideration that these buildings have been located on ejidal land without the consent of the assembly.
This decision was taken collectively by the nucleus of the assembly of the ejido, and they hold the state government of Chiapas and the federal government responsible for any acts of repression taken against them [as a result].
In February 2011, the Chiapas governor Juan Sabines Guerrero, in complicity with the authorities of various departments, the Chilon council and the official authorities of San Sebastian Bachajon, constructed an emergency response centre, decreed a permanent
state police presence in the area and thereby attempted to gain control of the natural resources and protected areas without the consent of the ejido assembly.
Subsequently, the state government convened the signing of an agreement on February 13th, 2011, in which they institutionalized the dispossession of 600 hectares of land [from the ejidatarios].
This is why the ejidatarios are saying Enough! [¡Basta!] and [re-]taking control.
Source: Radio Zapatista
****************************************************************************
SIPAZ REPORT VOL. XVI Nº 4 – NOVEMBER 2011
IN FOCUS : Ecotourism – Development with or without people?
WEDNESDAY, 30 NOVEMBER 2011
Below are extracts from this report, which can be read in full at:
In January of this year, the Mexican government declared 2011 as “the year of tourism,” toward the end of “aligning all related sectors with this activity so that they undertake actions that would allow more tourists to make Mexico the principal destination of their visits.” While the increase in violence rooted in the war declared by Felipe Calderón against drug trafficking has led to a decrease in the number of tourists in many parts of the country, the state of Chiapas continues to be an important tourist destination. The natural beauty and cultural riches of the state resulted in San Cristóbal de Las Casas hosting the VIII International Forum for Adventure Tourism in October.
Tourism in general, and more specifically alternative tourism and ecological tourism (eco-tourism), have been promoted as an excellent opportunity for remote, marginalized indigenous and campesino communities to escape poverty. Eco-tourism is seen by several conservation groups, international institutions, and governments as a viable alternative for sustainable development. Nevertheless, many communities are not convinced of the purported economic benefits, and they see this as a possible loss of control over their lands and lives. There have also been divisions in communities in which part of the population favors eco-tourist projects while other parts resist the implementation of such plans. In this sense, an eco-tourist project can imply impacts for the community as a whole, as it need not necessarily benefit all the people in question equally and equitably……..
In a communiqué in commemoration of the “Day of La Raza” on 12 October, various groups that are adherents to the Other Campaign pronounced themselves against this form of “development.” Regarding the Forum that would begin two days later, they commented, “We recognize in this initiative a new offensive within the concert of aggressions and violations of collective rights and of the self-determination of our peoples. At this point we say to the neo-liberal gentlemen that the land, the water, the forests, and the cultural and ceremonial centers are not for sale; they will instead be defended by dignified men and women who from below and to the left resist.”……..
The organization Otros Mundos Chiapas affirmed in a communiqué that “Tourism affects many things: […] it affects local cultures that are asked to make themselves available to tourism; it affects the waste of millions of pesos in advertising that could be destined to schools or hospitals; it affects through the repression and militarization against communities that do not want these activities and who struggle to defend their lands and territories in search of real alternatives for survival.” In more general terms, the Center for Superior Studies of Mexico and Central America (CESMECA) denounced that “Implicitly, they are trying to make people believe that the injustice and social inequality suffered by communities results from the ‘self-isolation’ that they impose upon themselves; and that with this type of tourist activities they can be included in ‘progress.’ The official line is that these economic activities are promoted so as to supposedly combat inequality and poverty, but strangely they fail to take into account the opinion and the rights of the principal protagonists, who are the original peoples of the region. It is evident that we are facing a clear demonstration of a modern adventure colonialism.”
Examples of negative impacts of eco-tourist projects
AGUA AZUL
The situation at the tourist center Agua Azul reflects many of the negative consequences of eco-tourism, both due to the division of the local population as well as to the militarization of the area. According to U.S. tourism consultants that have helped develop a state tourist strategy in Chiapas, “Agua Azul has the potential to create one of the greatest eco-tourist experiences in the Western Hemisphere,” as reported in an article in the Financial Times on 30 September 2011. A new tourist complex planned for the zone would consist of a first-class luxury hotel, a recreational area, a bar, and a restaurant overlooking the waterfalls. According to the article, the consultants also indicate that it would be necessary to involve the terrains neighboring the waterfalls so as to provide for sufficient space for leisure and to maintain the natural landscape as part of the beauty of the tourist complex. Indeed, in the neighboring Zapatista community of Bolom Ajaw there were confrontations at the beginning of 2010 between people of the community and members of the Organization for the Defense of the Rights of the Indigenous and Campesinos (OPDDIC). The dispute centers around the waterfalls located beside the community, in lands recovered by the Zapatistas in 1994—lands that are of great interest for tourism development.
In recent years there have been several conflicts and confrontations between locals in favor and opposed to tourism development of the Agua Azul zone. In 2008, adherents to the Other Campaign in San Sebastián Bachajón installed a booth to charge admission apart from the official checkpoint, in order to generate resources and raise awareness among tourists about the situation of conflict in the zone due to the disagreement of part of the population with the planned tourist development of the waterfalls. On 2 February of this year, this tense situation resulted in a confrontation between indigenous adherents of the Other Campaign opposed to tourist projects and a PRI group in favor of the projects, leaving one dead and several injured.
Since the confrontation, the Agua Azul zone and its surrounding areas have been heavily guarded by a deployment of hundreds of police and soldiers. Victor López, director of the Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Center for Human Rights (CDHFBC), referred to this intense militarization and the lack of consultation with the local population in a press conference after the release of those adherents to the Other Campaign who had been arrested after the confrontation. He mentioned that they continue to be “imprisoned” by a “unilateral process, with the police and the federal Army on their lands, in light of governmental projects that involved no consultation with local populations.”
In the attempt to construct an eco-tourist complex in this zone, the division of the population of the community of Agua Azul is seen clearly. On one side are the authorities of the ejido, supported by the government, who welcome the work and income that tourism could bring; on the other is a large part of the population, which insists on their right to maintain their form of life and their right to self-determination, who denounce intimidation, violence, and abuse of the legal system to take their lands from them. The Financial Times article ends by mentioning that for many, “eco-tourism implies a form of harmony between tourism and the environment.” But this search seems to exclude the local population from the equation.
****************************************************************************
“Detention and Torture” of Other Campaign Adherents from San Sebastián Bachajón
** Chilón ejido members denounce the complicity of the state police
** Indigenous people are taken away without arrest warrants and assault charges are fabricated against them
By: Hermann Bellinghausen, October 2, 2011
Ejido members from San Sebastián Bachajón, municipality of Chilón, Chiapas, denounced unwarranted detentions, thefts and torture against Other Campaign adherents in recent days, perpetrated by the State Preventive Police (PEP, its initials in Spanish), acting in complicity with the pro-government groups in the region.
They pointed out that Miguel Vázquez Deara was captured by the PEP last September 26th without an arrest warrant. “Through montages and false statements” they attempted to blame him for different assaults [1] on the Ocosingo-Palenque Highway. The other day, the accused “appeared” at the Indigenous Prosecutor’s Office, tracked down by a lawyer for the transportation society where he works.
The litigator was able to document that the detainee “was obliged to tell who the leaders of the Other Campaign are” and as “there were no reasons for detaining him, they took him to a stretch of highway, put a weapon on him, thus making him an assailant.” The police have acted at the urging of Juan Álvaro Moreno, leader of the PVEM, and very close to the group of ejido members who, together with the police, occupied the ticket booth for the Agua Azul waterfalls and turned it over to the government without the community’s agreement, headed by Francisco Guzmán Jiménez, Goyito, and Miguel Ruiz Hernández.
“It is evident that it is the police themselves who perpetrate the assaults on that stretch [of road]” the ejido members maintain, warning tourists who visit Agua Azul “to take precautionary measures, because they may receive you like [they received] a group of retired teachers, who they assaulted [only] 300 metres away from the preventive police”. On the other hand, “they throw everything at social strugglers”. On September 26th, police searched the residence of Juan Aguilar Guzmán, ex-political prisoner, “apparently, in search of a [weapons] arsenal as [he is the] main leader of the Other Campaign”.
They went in “shooting with firearms, hitting a woman, and frightening the children, and they didn’t find anything”. The agents “stole sound equipment, a cell phone, torches and 5,000 pesos, destroying everything. They left a disaster site, detaining and taking away compañero Jerónimo Aguilar Espinoza without any arrest warrant, and after hours of torture, they set him free the next day, without signing anything”.
Already on September 7th, the Other Campaign adherent Antonio Estrada, after five days “of being tortured,” was assigned to jail on the 12th and processed on the 13th, “after mounting an alleged assault at kilometer 100 of the highway stretch, (according to) statements by the Federal Police, when he was detained at kilometre 93 by the preventive [police]”.
“Against social strugglers, not against criminals”
These actions “are directed against social strugglers, not against crime.” The denuncia maintains that: “there is a lot of violence in the ejido, more disconnected all the time, and the police presence in the communities is more violent, they say in order to combat the highway assaults in Xanil and at the Agua Azul crossing.” Nevertheless, “thanks to the presence of the preventive police, the assaults have increased. The real criminals” are found in the oficialista (pro-government) group. Just September 21st “a planting of drugs by a group of people from Jukuton” was confiscated but the ejidal commission covered for them.
Threats against the Other Campaign are continuous, when it is this organization “that is doing its work to detain the criminals, because the real criminals are the oficialistas”, conclude the ejido members.
The British newspaper, the Financial Times, in its edition last Friday [September] 30th, published an unusual special report about San Sebastián Bachajón and the conflict over the ticket booth at the access to the waterfalls. In “Paradise in Dispute,” Fionn O’Sullivan describes with objectivity the violent acts and illegal detentions (more than 100) against the Other Campaign in San Sebastián. The article attributes these acts to governmental and private ambitions for developing an “exclusive” ecotourist centre at the location.
“Despite the fact that the government built another ticket booth and there are police barracks, no tourist development seems imminent. For many, ecotourism implies a harmony between visitors and the environment. Given the competing visions of Agua Azul’s future, everything indicates that wealthy foreigners and Mexico’s rich will not reach their version of Nirvana soon.”
[1] Assault, as used in the above context, is armed robbery of travellers.
____________________________________________________
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Sunday, October 2, 2011
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2011/10/02/politica/015n1pol
**************************************************************************
Mexico: paradise in dispute
By Fionn O’Sullivan
September, 2011
Originally published in the Financial Times
Rainy season: a view of the cascades, looking out from Agua Azul towards the planned resort site (obscured by forest)
At 10am the tropical sun still has not fully warmed the streets of Agua Azul, a village cut out of the Lacandon rainforest in the Mexican state of Chiapas. Palm and banana trees line the way into the centre of town. The streets are quiet.
Agua Azul is close to the Mayan city of Palenque, which flourished in the seventh century before being abandoned, its temples swallowed by the forest. While its indigenous inhabitants speak the Tzeltal Mayan language, the dialect used to inscribe hieroglyphs on Palenque’s royal tombs is still recognisable to their Chol-speaking neighbours.
Agua Azul and the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido (collectively owned land) that surrounds it could be any of a hundred other settlements in Chiapas’s rural outback. What makes Agua Azul different is the beauty of the local river whose turquoise waters cascade over waterfalls.
The quietness of the village is deceptive: the community is split in a violent dispute that has already cost one life and led to more than 100 arrests. At the heart of the conflict is a plan is to build an exclusive luxury retreat on the ejido lands.
On one side is the government, backed by the ejido authorities, who see the income and jobs that tourism development will bring. They say care has been taken to consult and ensure the whole community benefits. But some ejido residents tell a different story. They insist on their right to a future that respects their own way of life, and claim intimidation, violence and blatant abuse of the legal system are being deployed to take over their land.
For wealthy Mexicans and foreigners looking for something exotic, a resort in Agua Azul would be perfect. Spirited into the wilderness by helicopter, visitors would find luxurious but eco-friendly cabins next to thunderous waterfalls, while pristine forests around teem with rare wildlife kept at a short but safe distance.
In spite of the unrelenting drug war, southern Mexico remains relatively stable and attracts millions of tourists every year. For Chiapas’s government, Agua Azul is a central project in a wider strategy to open up the state’s indigenous areas. It looks to the development of Cancún and the Yucatán peninsula as a model.
There is much at stake. When the US tourism consultants who helped develop the state’s tourism strategy say that Agua Azul has the potential to create one of the most outstanding resort experiences in the western hemisphere, they may not be exaggerating.
Tourism experts have identified several possibilities for the new resort, including what they call a world-class boutique hotel and a lodge retreat, along with a bar and restaurant looking directly out on to the cascades. But they also say that acquiring the surrounding lands is vital to provide space for the resort and to maintain the views.
While the official ejido leadership wants to co-operate with the government, a substantial faction is implacably opposed. They know the resort can only be built on their lands, and they are not prepared to go quietly.
I sit down to talk to community members opposed to the resort plans. Two of them, Juan Aguilar and Domingo Gomez, have just been released after spending nearly six months in prison along with three others on charges including murder and attempted murder. Aguilar, in his early 30s, speaks confidently; Gomez is older, more subdued. He says he hardly speaks any Spanish.
Every time I ask a question, the group confers in Tzeltal, then one of them answers. Aguilar explains what tourism development means.
“The bad government thinks it’s going to get a lot of money out of here with the tourist centre,” he says. “But if that happens, they aren’t going to be letting ejido members in. That’s what happens in Cancún – the people aren’t allowed in because it’s for tourists. That’s not going to happen here. We’re ready to defend our land.” When asked if this includes armed struggle, he shakes his head. “None of us have guns,” he says.
But will the project not bring jobs? “I’m not a driver,” he says. “Who’s going to give me a driver’s job? What about the people who operate the diggers and other machinery? We don’t know how to do that. The government will bring in other workers.”
If Chiapas is known for something other than lost Mayan cities in the jungle, it is the Zapatista uprising. Launched on the day in 1994 that Mexico joined the North American Free Trade Agreement, it brought fame to Subcomandante Marcos, its eloquent, balaclava-clad spokesman. The rebellion was quickly subdued, but “autonomous municipalities” sprang up in the rebel areas and remain self-governing today. Seventeen years on, the military encampments and roadblocks across the region are a testament to the rawness of rural politics and the Zapatistas’ continuing appeal. The ejidatarios I sit down with are members of The Other Campaign, an affiliated group.
From the outset, the Zapatistas’ opposition to Mexico’s embrace of globalisation is clear. My informants tell me the story of the ejido and of an adjoining piece of “recovered land” that was occupied after 1994. “There was a latifundista [big landowner] there, it was just for the rich; 1,000ha with nothing but bloody cattle. But before the cattle came, our grandfathers worked there – working for nothing but their food, like stable hands.
“Later on, there wasn’t enough land for the children of the Bachajón ejidatarios. The cattle were eating everything while we were starving. When the movement took off in 1994, they moved there. The landlord ran away.”
The 100-mile drive back from Agua Azul takes four hours, along roads that wind up and down the forested valleys. As the road climbs gradually upwards, rainforest gives way to pine.
A Tzeltal-Spanish translator inadvertently gives me an insight into how many indigenous people in Chiapas experience the expansion of the market into their semi-subsistence economy. “It can be hard to translate between the two languages,” she says. “Take a word like capitalism – there’s nothing comparable in Tzeltal. I just say ‘the big rich ones’, [los grandes ricos], and people understand.”
Earlier this year, the struggle at Bachajón took a bloody turn. On February 2, the ejido authorities and their supporters arrived to seize control of the toll booth that controls entry to Agua Azul, evicting members of The Other Campaign who were administering it.
Later that day, a pro-government supporter was shot dead and another severely wounded. The next morning, as The Other Campaign members gathered close to the main highway, state and federal police moved in, arresting 117. Three days later, the Chiapas authorities called a conference, saying there was a need to avoid further bloodshed. The government says it has worked hard to resolve the dispute over the toll booth, but the oppositionists in Bachajón refused to take part in talks.
A few days later, most of the detainees were released, but 10 were charged with offences including murder and attempted murder. Five tested positive on firearms tests, and the charges were backed up with the testimonies of several witnesses. The accused denied the charges, saying that it was the ejido authorities’ side that had opened fire.
Of the 10 detainees, five were freed two months later. Then, in July, the public prosecutor dropped the charges against four of the remaining prisoners. The last, a minor with learning disabilities, was put under the care of the state. With their release, no one is now charged with the February killing.
I talk to Ricardo Lagunes, who works for the Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Center, about the case in the city of San Cristóbal de Las Casas. He speaks passionately about what he says were violations of due process – charges that the government denies. “They arrested 117 people on the day,” says Lagunes. “Many don’t speak Spanish. They manipulated their testimonies, didn’t let them use interpreters, or, where they did, they didn’t let them read what they had to sign.”
He continues: “When the public prosecutor suddenly withdrew the charges, he made no reference to the witness statements against the five remaining detainees. The order to free the prisoners was as arbitrary as the act of detaining them … The judicial system was neither independent nor impartial; instead, it placed itself at the disposal of the government.”
Aguilar says that when The Other Campaign members were in prison, government representatives offered to set them free if they agreed to sign an agreement relinquishing control of the toll booth.
For its part, the government insists it complied with the law throughout the judicial process. Its press department stresses that Juan Sabines Guerrero, the governor, has repeatedly called for the dispute to be resolved peacefully. “We are the defenders of the indigenous people’s cause, their autonomy and self-determination. It is because of this that we are calling for dialogue in each community,” he said just after the February violence.
For the moment, Agua Azul is calm. The government has built a new toll booth and a police barracks, but there are no signs of imminent resort development.
For many, eco-tourism implies a kind of harmony between tourism and the environment. But given the competing visions of Agua Azul’s future, it seems wealthy foreigners and Mexico’s rich are unlikely to find their version of nirvana soon.
The ‘Cataratas de Agua Azul’ are found in the Mexican state of Chiapas. They are located 69 kilometers from Palenque on the road that runs from San Christobal de las Casas.
*****************************************************************************
21st-Century Solidarity: Video Messages and the Other Campaign
On July 23, the Mexican government released the Bachajón 4, political prisoners from the southern state of Chiapas, who had been unjustly detained for over five months for defending their communal land from government-sponsored eco-tourist development. Their liberation was celebrated by indigenous groups across Mexico, international supporters, as well as by members of the Other Campaign, a Zapatista-aligned network launched in 2006 to unite those fighting from below and outside the electoral system. What is most unique about this story, however, is the role that international organizing and multimedia tactics played in the release of the political prisoners, and the fact that the campaign was largely led by a Zapatista-affiliated immigrant-based organization in Harlem, New York—Movement for Justice in El Barrio (MJB).
San Sebastián Bachajón is a Zapatista-aligned indigenous community in the heart of resource-rich Chiapas. For two years community residents had fought off multimillion-dollar government sponsored “eco-tourism” projects aimed at developing and exploiting the nearby Agua Azul waterfall, which is located on the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido, or communal land. These development projects came as part of the U.S.-backed Project Mesoamerica, formerly known as Plan Puebla Panama, which promotes militarization and megaprojects including superhighways, dams, and open-pit mines across Mexico and Central America.
As a community in resistance to what they call “the bad government” San Sebastián Bachajón strives for autonomy and implements economic strategies to fulfill that goal. The highway that crosses their land is highly trafficked by tourists traveling to and from the Mayan ruins of Palenque. To help alleviate poverty in their community, they installed a community-run tollboth. According to community members, the tollbooth has helped them to finance remedies for the sick, and build a community church.
Since the Zapatista uprising in 1994, Mexican political parties, regardless of who is in office, have attempted to co-opt members of autonomous indigenous communities by offering them much needed building supplies, food, and other resources in exchange for their political support. This has created divisions between those striving for economic and territorial autonomy and those cooperating with the government. In February 2011, tensions mounted when supporters of Mexico’s powerful Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) attempted to take over the tollbooth as a strategy to counter Bachajón’s autonomy by severing one of its lifelines. An ensuing confrontation resulted in the arrest of 117 Bachajón community members. Most were quickly released, but officials accused 10 people of shooting and killing a government supporter. They were held for months, and throughout their imprisonment they maintained their innocence. According to the Chiapas-based Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Center (FRAYBA), the detained did not have proper legal representation and lacked interpretation from Spanish to their native language, Tzeltal. FRAYBA also stated that it believed the PRI attack was orchestrated by the state government of Chiapas.1
San Sebastián Bachajón asked for support from Other Campaign member organizations and international allies. New York’s MJB answered the call. Coordinating with groups in over a dozen countries on four continents, they declared a national day of action for Bachajón on March 7, 2011, a little over one month after the imprisonment. People in San Sebastián Bachajón then produced a video message to the MJB that starts deep in the Lacandón Jungle.
“We do not want to give up our [territory] because it is where we work to cultivate food for our children,” says Amalia, a Bachajón community member speaking in Tzeltal. She continues talking about the sacredness of their natural resources like the Agua Azul waterfall.
“We thank all the organizations that have opened their hearts to us and are struggling with us to recognize the problems that we face as an indigenous community,” says Juan, another member of the Bachajón community speaking directly to the camera.
Within weeks, the Chiapas State Attorney General’s Office, which was holding the detainees, responded by releasing half of the 10 prisoners. This first message was just the beginning. In early April 2011, MJB coordinated five days of global action for the Bachajón prisoners. MJB members protested in New York City for two days at the Mexican Consulate, and Canadian supporters protested outside the consulate in Montreal.
The Chiapas police responded to the days of action with repression. According to an MJB press release, on April 9, 2011, 800 police and military descended on the community, violently displacing community members.
“It is clear that these acts of aggression were provoked by the organized resistance of the people of Bachajón and by the national and international pressure,” the press release read the following day. “We must not rest until our five brothers are in complete freedom.”2
MJB called for another round of global action. Over the coming months, MJB and the Bachajón community would produce three more videos. They were translated into English and French and shared both on the Internet and during coordinated actions in France and Canada. In a following video message, MJB members spoke directly to those in Bachajón about the difficulties they face as Mexican immigrants in New York, fighting displacement from their homes and neighborhood, and their struggle to maintain their cultural identity.
By July, the international pressure had grown too strong. The Mexican government dropped the charges, releasing one political prisoner in early July and the remaining four—the Bachajón 4—in late July.
At a press conference in San Cristóbal de las Casas, following their release former political prisoner Domingo Pérez Álvaro said the Mexican government continues to repress them for their defending the earth, natural resources, and their ejido.
“As organization members we defend what has been left by our ancestors and great grandparents. But the government wants to dissolve our organization. They don’t want to see indigenous communities unified in defence of their land,” added Álvaro.
Conflicts over land and natural resources between indigenous communities and government forces is an age-old story that has been played on repeat across the Americas for the past 500 years. In Chiapas, these conflicts have surfaced with increasing frequency since 1994, when the indigenous Zapatista Army for National Liberation rose up to declare its autonomy and resistance to the neoliberal projects that it viewed as its death. To repress the Zapatistas the government has employed numerous paramilitary operations and encouraged the incursion of political parties, especially the PRI, to attempt to buy off members of indigenous communities.
“Today’s war is for the land,” wrote Uruguayan journalist Raúl Zibechi in a letter sent in May 2011 in solidarity with those in Bachajón. “To appropriate the life that it provides for and reproduces. Therefore, indigenous peoples and campesinos are the primary obstacles that must be done away with. Ever since capital decided that everything is a commodity for doing business and accumulating more capital, no space on earth remains—not even the slightest corner—that can free itself from this ambition.”3
The conflict that San Sebastián Bachajón suffered with the PRI is not new, but the role of multimedia and international organizing in the release of the Bachajón prisoners is. For these organizations, this style of organizing has largely emerged since the Zapatistas launched the Other Campaign in 2006. Fed up with the oligarchic Mexican political system, the Other Campaign called on Mexican supporters to oppose the 2006 presidential elections and instead focus on organizing around their own local collective struggles. Subcomandante Marcos and thousands of supporters traversed 32 Mexican states listening to community concerns and uniting, as the Zapatista’s 6th Declaration from the Lacandón Jungle states, “resistance groups [to] learn about the struggles they face in their communities and rally support against the neoliberal and capitalistic federal political system.”
Since then, the Other Campaign has served as a common ideological platform that helps mobilize support around certain campaigns in Mexico and in Mexican immigrant communities abroad. Groups around the world have embraced the spirit of the 6th Declaration, and stood in solidarity with the Other Campaign members.
*
MJB, founded in 2005, quickly joined the Other Campaign from abroad. As an organization largely composed of low-income Mexican immigrants living in the rapidly gentrifying neighbourhood of East Harlem, they mobilize against housing evictions and greedy landlords and connect this struggle to the effects of neoliberalism and the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) that displaced them from their Mexican homeland. (Most MJB members were forced to migrate to the United States from their rural state of Puebla, after NAFTA went into effect in 1994 and subsistence farming because increasingly difficult due to the sudden influx of low-priced genetically modified U.S. corn.)
Also commonly referred to as the Other Campaign NY, MJB has over the years organized encuentros, or meetings. With their unique style of urban zapatismo, MJB members and encuentro participants have shared their stories of struggle confronting gentrification in NYC, ending repression of queer youth of colour, stopping wage theft of low-wage workers, and more.
“Rebels who are fighting for dignity and against displacement came together to voice their presence, their rage, their struggle, and their dreams,” MJB described of their first and second encuentros in 2007 and 2008 in a June 2009 communiqué. “We broke down the fences that power constructs to divide us, we listened to one another’s voices, and we learned from one another.”
This is also the essence of MJB’s use of multimedia tools that can transcend artificially created borders and build solidarity between immigrant struggles in the United States and resistance to neoliberal megaprojects abroad. The videos are produced collectively, with members deciding on the scope and content of the video. Throughout the years they have brought the messages of South Africa’s Shackdwellers’ Movement—Abahlali baseMjondolo—fighting forced evictions; campesinos in San Salvador Atenco, Mexico, struggling to free their imprisoned family members; and more recently the political prisoners of Bachajón.4
“We think that the borders are not an obstacle to our struggle. The struggle doesn’t have borders,” says MJB member Filiberto Hernández. “Really we can do whatever we can to arrive at them, and cross them with our screams. We are destroying these borders and have travelled to many places in Mexico, here in New York, and in Europe presenting these videos.”
In 2008 and 2009 hundreds of MJB members were fighting eviction by the London-based transnational real estate company Dawnay Day. To bolster their fight, MJB member Juan Haro traveled to England, France, Scotland, and Spain to meet with people who were also facing eviction by the same company. MJB was eventually victorious in this fight; the company sold the buildings and residents were not forcefully evicted. According to Hernández their transnational organizing helped them connect with many people in Europe who subsequently joined the struggle to liberate the prisoners of Bachajón and spread the video messages.
Clearly the liberation of the Bachajón prisoners was the joint work of many forces, but this victory shows that independent media and YouTube videos can play a key role in political-prisoner struggles.
In 2006, hundreds of people were arrested in San Salvador Atenco, a town about 15 miles northeast of Mexico City, during a brutal federal police raid following a pair of demonstrations over flower-vendor restrictions and education reforms. Twelve people received hefty prison sentences, including Ignacio del Valle Medina, who was charged with aggravated kidnapping and sentenced to 112 years in jail. In reality, the politically motivated sentence was a move to sanction Del Valle for his role as the leader of the People’s Front in Defence of Land, which had been fighting to block the construction of an airport on communal lands in San Salvador Atenco. During Del Valle’s imprisonment, MJB held Skype teleconferences with his family members, bringing their voices to the United States during encuentros and regional meetings such as the Allied Media Conference and U.S. Social Forum. After a four-year national and international struggle, Del Valle and other political prisoners from San Salvador Atenco were freed just days after the June 2010 U.S. Social Forum in Detroit.
“When there are voices from abroad denouncing what’s happening in this country, the government listens,” explains Del Valle. “Without these brothers and sisters, we wouldn’t have been freed. It shows us that our voice of liberty doesn’t have limits and our shouts for freedom and justice do not have borders.”
This style of international solidarity has deep roots. Matt Meyers—a long time activist who works on political prisoner issues in the United States—says that over the past 40 years there have been various international efforts to demand the freedom of black power and Puerto Rican and Chicano activists in the United States. During the 1980s many U.S. university students were active in the fight for the liberation of political prisoners under apartheid South Africa. Meyers believes that “there is a strategic necessity for transnational struggle.”
“With international organizing we can be two fists striking the same opponent with the same blow,” he adds, paraphrasing Samora Machel, a revolutionary leader and former president of Mozambique.
With the birth of the Occupy Wall Street movement, Movement for Justice in El Barrio has strived to connect zapatismo with the cries of the 99%. They have collected thousands of signatures from occupiers denouncing increasing paramilitary repression of zapatistas. They also recorded a video message of solidarity from Occupy Wall Street and projected the video in Chiapas at an indigenous training centre during a Zapatista-aligned Anti-Systemic Seminary at the end of 2011 and beginning of 2012.
Capital crosses national borders with ease, immigrants cross with great difficulty. International solidarity among organizers, activists, and social movements can be a powerful transformative force. With its video messages Movement for Justice in El Barrio has been able to successfully transcend borders and wage successful battles for the liberation of political prisoners using the innovative technology of the 21st century.
Andalusia Knoll is a Brooklyn-based multimedia journalist, educator, and organizer. She has reported for Upside Down World, Left Turn, Democracy Now!, Free Speech Radio News, and TeleSUR. In New York, she organizes for farmworker justice and against deportations and teaches radio drama.
1. Centro de Derechos Humanos Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas, “The Frayba Report: San Sebastián Bachajón and the Struggle for Natural Resources,” Radio Zapatista, February 24, 2011.
2. NACLA, “Global Action for Release of Indigenous Zapatista Supporters in Mexico,” April 22, 2011.
3. Raúl Zibechi, “Carta de Raul Zibechi en apoyo a Bachajon y al zapatista Patricio Dominguez Vazquez,” Multimedios Cronopios, May 6, 2011.
4. Movement for Justice in El Barrio, “From El Barrio to Durban,” Zapagringo (blog), October 1, 2009.
Three of the videos mentioned in the articles can be seen here:
Third Message from San Sebastián Bachajón:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R4frTkfDkuc
Message from The Other Campaign New York to San Sebastián Bachajón:
*******************************************************************************
Indigenous of San Sebastián Bachajón Reaffirm Their Defence of Territory
** Bishop Raúl Vera thanks them for their “example and teaching”
By: Hermann Bellinghausen,
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, July 28, 2011.
Bishop Raúl Vera met in this city with the liberated prisoners from San Sebastián Bachajón and the region’s Other Campaign authorities that correspond to San José en Rebeldía in the autonomous Zapatista cartography, in the historic Tzeltal heart of Chilón. Vera thanked the indigenous for their “example of struggle for territory, and the lesson of how to walk, resisting and struggling.”
The Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Center (Frayba) reported that within the framework of the regular meeting of its board of directors, over which the Bishop of Saltillo presides, the five ex political prisoners “shared the joy” of their liberation, and they thanked in turn “that in all this process we did not leave them alone in their struggle.”
The ejido members “reaffirmed that their struggle is for the defence of their land and territory, and that they will continue organizing with the compañeros and compañeras.”
For its part, the Frayba declared that: “with this type of joy we continue constructing their vision that, starting from the inalienable right of the people to self-determination and of the peoples to autonomy, cultural diversity and a dignified life, the organized people defend and generate new practices in the exercise of rights to live fully their human rights.”
For their part, as for closing this chapter of a history that has not ended, the ejido members of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Other Campaign, from their community thanked the solidarity they received: “Thank you for trusting in us, in spite of the bad government’s blackmail, offering us miseries and attempting to buy our dignity to let it prostitute our lands. For our struggle, for our sufferings, those from below resist, we are here and we will continue.”
They clarified that the liberation of their compañeros “does not want to say that we stop struggling, but to the contrary, we will continue strengthening ourselves every day,” because “the defence of Mother Earth and her resources” is “interminable.”
They added: “Being human like we are, we must be very conscious, because the bad government is taking (the land) as an object for profit.” They trust that their recent experience may be “a clear example that the movement we have started is not political, but for our Mother Earth,” and they demanded “dignified justice for the people and the world.” The indigenous called on the collectives, organizations and media that supported us in recent months to continue doing it. “That this may be a thank you, not a goodbye, because we are going to continue struggling.”
____________________________________________________
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2011/07/29/politica/020n2pol
*******************************************************************************
They Free the Last 4 of the “Bachajón 5”
The campesinos remained prisoners more than five months in the prison of Playas de Catazajá, accused of the murder of an Agua Azul ejido member.
Hermann Bellinghausen,
Published: 24/07/2011
San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas.
The last four of the Bachajón Five were liberated this Saturday. The campesinos, adherents of the Other Campaign from San Sebastián Bachajón ejido (Chilón Municipality), who remained prisoners more than five months in the Playas de Catazajá prison, accused of the murder of an ejido member from Agua Azul (Tumbalá), and of alleged crimes related tp protests at the Agua Azul crossing in the first week in February. Although the serious charges turned out to be false, the indigenous men remained incarcerated as hostages of the government, according to what the Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Human Rights Center (Frayba) has been maintaining.
Juan Aguilar Guzmán, Jerónimo Guzmán Méndez, Domingo García Gómez and Domingo Pérez Álvaro, who several times denounced mistreatment by authorities of the Social Re-adaptation Center for the Sentenced Number 17, are now in their community. On July 7, Mariano Demeza Silvano was released, a prisoner in the Villa Crisol (Berriozábal) re-adaptation centre for minors.
Its appropriate to remember here that this persecution against the indigenous men happened within the context of a conflict in San Sebastián Bachajón over the ejido owners ticket booth at the access to the Agua Azul Cascades, an important tourist attraction in the states northern jungle. The ticket booth, installed by the ejido members, was attacked by members of the PRI and PVEM (Colosio Foundation), who acted destroying and robbing whatever was in their way, and they violently appropriated the spot for themselves at the beginning of February, with the backup of the Federal Army (Ejército) and the police who have remained stationed there ever since.
In those acts Marcos García Moreno, from the aggressor group, lost his life, and the Other Campaign members were blamed, when it really was the ideology of the Secretary General of the Government, they said, upon denouncing the attack as a product of the private meetings between officials and officialist [pro-government] ejido owner.
The incarceration of the indigenous men originated dozens of protest actions at consulates and embassies of Mexico in Europe, the United States, South Africa, Australia and Argentina for several months, besides mobilizations in Chiapas and other parts of the country.
On the Chiapas Coast, Other Campaign protests were repressed and gave way to new incarcerations, although for just a few days.
Movement for Justice in the Barrio, of the Other Campaign in New York, which animated and diffused these solidarity protests and played a determining role in their organization, confirmed last night the liberation of the Tzeltal campesinos, and today Frayba, in charge of their legal defence, confirmed it.
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/ultimas/2011/07/24/124346582-liberan-a-ultimos-4-de-los-5-de-bachajonc
*******************************************************************************
Jubilation at the release of the remaining 4 political prisoners of San Sebastián Bachajón
24th July 2011
The Movement for Justice in El Barrio, New York, La Otra Campaña would like to share with everyone the great news about the release of social activists who endured unjust convictions imposed out of pure revenge by the misrule of repressive Governor Juan Sabines (PRD ) and repressive PAN President Felipe Calderon, just because they resisted and defended their land and autonomy as indigenous peoples.
They had to endure five months of unjust imprisonment.
Their strength and courage have been an inspiration and a powerful reason for the Movement for Justice to keep fighting.
In El Barrio, New York we are celebrating because we know that this was not a triumph of the rule of law that does not exist in Mexico, but a triumph of the organization and mobilization of all our sisters and brothers, San Sebastián Bachajón ejidatarios and our comrades’ of good heart in Mexico and all over the world.
We embrace you all, and salute you as well.
In the spirit of “If they touch one of us, it is an injury to all “, together we fought and secured the release of our brothers in San Sebastián Bachajón.
Viva the ejidatarios and San Sebastián Bachajón!
Viva the EZLN!
Viva La Otra Campaña!
******************************************************************************
Defending Their Lands, the Only Crime of Bachajón Ejido Members in Prison: Zibechi
** “They are victims of the political class that works for the transnationals”
By: Hermann Bellinghausen
San Cristóbal de las Casas, 3rd May, 2011.
“The only crime that the San Sebastián ejido members committed is wanting to live on their lands, the lands of their grandparents, of their more remote ancestors, that they now want to be appropriated by the multi-nationals of money and death. The five ejido members that have been prisoners since February 3, as well as Patricio Domínguez Vázquez, detained the middle of April in Monte Redondo ejido in Frontera Comalapa municipio, are victims of the political class that works for the multi-nationals.”
The political analyst Raúl Zibechi stated this in a message sent from Montevideo, Uruguay, with which he adds himself to the international demand for the liberation of the five Bachajón prisoners, Other Campaign adherents, and of Domínguez Vázquez, Zapatista support base from Tierra y Libertad autonomous municipio, which in recent days demonstrated in 33 cities, just in France, and in 20 cities of other countries.
“The war today is for the land, for appropriating the life that it shelters and reproduces, and for that the indigenous and campesinos are mere obstacles that must be discarded. Ever since capital decided that everything is merchandise, no space of corner on the planet remains that can be free of that ambition.
“To appropriate the land for themselves, they unleashed what the Zapatistas call the Fourth World War (WW IV), which in Latin America passes for expelling millions of people from more than 100 million hectares in dispute. The big projects of open sky mining, monocrops of sugar cane, corn and soybeans for producing gasoline, and tree plantations for manufacturing cellulose, are killing the life and the people from south to north.”
In some cases, he points out, “as happened to Patricio, not only are they incarcerated, but they burn their homes because in reality they want them to abandon their land.” That war “has lasted sixty years in Colombia,” where it has permitted more than four million hectáreas “to pass from campesinos to paramilitaries, since they offer themselves as security for the multi-nationals.” A war that seeks to expel campesinos, “more than three million in the past 20 years,” and clear territories for the speculation of capital.
“In Colombia, the war’s territories coincide exactly with those that the mining companies and infrastructure megaprojects covet.”
The same thing is happening now on the rest of the continent, the Uruguayan write adds: “the government of Brazil is converting the Amazon’s rivers into sources of cheap energy for the big corporations,” with gigantic dams “on whose construction work 10, 15 and up to 20, 000 poorly paid and even more poorly housed, new slaves at the service of the governments submissive to capital, and when they rebel, as happened in Jirau ( Roraima state) in March, they are accused of being ‘bandits.’
“What hurts the most, and what teaches the most, is how the political class that was once said to be the Left joins together with the political class that was always the right to expel and incarcerate campesino and indigenous peoples, demonstrating that they are all the same when they’re dealing with attacking those from below to make business for those from above. And they use ‘ecological’ arguments because they learned the politically correct excuses for falsely representing the dispossession.”
Directing himself to the Movement for Justice in El Barrio, of New York, “from this corner of the continent,” Zibechi adds himself to the campaign “for the freedom of the Bachajón 5 and for Patricio,” and expresses that “solidarity and fraternity among the peoples knows no borders, nor can it expect anything from those above of from the institutions. We only depend on ourselves. ”
____________________________________
Originally Published in Spanish by La Jornada
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
http://www.jornada.unam.mx/2011/05/04/index.php?section=politica&article=016n2pol
********************************************************************************
Worldwide Declaration in Support of the Indigenous Tzeltal Peoples of
San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas, Adherents of the Other Campaign
May 1st, 2011
In Chiapas, Mexico, the investment in eco-tourism and infrastructure, in the logic of governmental “development” via the “Palenque Integrally Planned Center” (CIPP), which is also part of another more ambitious project called “Mesoamérica” (previously known as Plan
Puebla Panamá), remains a central dispute against the construction of alternatives ways of life offered by the native peoples of Chiapas. They have for many years sought the recognition of their autonomy as indigenous peoples within a framework of “free determination” and in practice are exercising their autonomy. These are peoples who have
historically conserved their natural resources and territory in equilibrium with humane and rational relationships. The civil resistance of the ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón (SSB), adherents to The Other Campaign (TOC) in the Agua Azul region can be found within this struggle for survival.
People who fight in defense of their rights face numerous forces, emanating from the neoliberal governments, which seek to destroy the organization and efforts to build other possible worlds. Today, the government of Chiapas continues to arbitrarily detain five ejidatarios of SSB of TOC, who are subjected to endless harassment and threats.
Innocent of their accused crimes, these ejidatarios are victims of the corrupted Mexican justice system, which obeys the interests of national and international investment. This system works to repress and destroy the communities, organizations, and individuals who do not coincide with the neoliberal government’s interests – interests that ravage and bring death to those who strive for a life where human rights are fully developed and lived.
The most recent repression that the ejidatarios have faced occurred on April 9, 2011, when around 800 agents of state, federal, and military police forces displaced roughly 126 ejidatarios of SSB and TOC who just hours earlier had regained control of the tollbooth. It was, moreover, this same tollbooth that was seized from them on February 2, as part of a concerted effort by the Chiapas government and “officials” of the ejido. The Agua Azul region has become a perfect example of how state and federal governments exercise the full force
of the State towards the historical displacement of indigenous peoples from their territory.
Due to the innumerable violations of human rights committed against the ejidatarios of SSB of TOC, the collectives, committees, social organizations and civil society, we pronounce the following:
1. Respect for the right of the Tseltal people of San Sebastián Bachajón to free determination and to exercise their autonomy as stipulated in the Agreement (No. 169) regarding indigenous and tribal peoples in independent countries; United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the San Andrés Accords, Document 1,
3. 1. Document 2, II, IV (2. 3.); Document 3.1 (c, d); Document 1, Principle of the New Relationship 5.
2. Respect for the right to use and enjoy their natural resources, which as indigenous peoples they have protected for centuries, as referenced in the Agreement (No. 169) regarding indigenous and tribal peoples in independent countries: art. 13.2; United Nations
Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. San Andrés Accords, 1.4 B. 2.; Document 1, Principle of the New Relationship 2.
3. The immediate release of Jerónimo Guzmán Méndez, ejidatario of TOC; Domingo Pérez Álvaro, member of the Commission to Promote TOC; Juan Aguilar Guzmán, head cashier of TOC; Domingo García Gómez, member of the Human Rights Defense Committee; Mariano Demeza Silvano, adolescent member of TOC.
4. The immediate withdrawal of the police and military entities that maintain under siege the area of the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido, concretely, from the entrances to the Agual Azul resort that is presently administered by the state and federal governments.
*****************************************************************************
Video messages from San Sebastian Bachajon
The residents of community San Sebastian Bachajon send us these video messages to tell their story.
The community has controlled the toll booth at the entrance to the Agua Azul Waterfalls for decades, but recently local police and paramilitaries have made threats against this community on a daily basis. A roadblock at the site and international solidarity campaign have resisted some of the repression, but harrassment and violence continues. Cuurrently 5 community members are unlawfully detained. The community demands their immediate release and that justice be done in their community.
Video message 06 March 2011
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcTspD7NKmY&feature=related
Segundo Mensaje de San Sebastian Bachajon (video message 01 April 2011)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7YRULc-2cBY
Tercer Mensaje de San Sebastián Bachajón(video message 24 April 2011)
****************************************************************************
san sebastian bachajon ejido, adherents to the other campaign of the sixth declaration of the lacandon jungle, chiapas, mexico.
april 24, 2011.
to the national and international human rights
to the civil society in mexico and the world
to the national and international other campaign
to movement for justice in el barrio of the other campaign of new york and their allies around the world
to the autonomous municipalities
to the organizations in defense of our mother earth in atenco
compañeros and compañeras.
to movement for justice in el barrio of new york, once more we wish to thank you for this enormous solidarity. we, men and women of san sebastian bachajon, adherents to the other campaign, want to thank you for all of this great support that you are providing us and at the same time align ourselves in solidarity with this noble cause for the liberation of our political prisoners, since the government has revealed another face of violence and repression against our compañeros by militarizing the area and intimidating the society with the presence of the army and navy, as if it were a war zone, all of this is due to the interest in our natural resources and the great wealth that our ejido has. thanks to the patronage of felipe calderon inojosa and of the corrupt government of juan sabines guerrero and his ambitious allies, such as francisco guzman jimenez, also know as goyito; manuel jimenez moreno; juan alvaro moreno; miguel ruiz hernandez, ex member of the other campaign, as chief negotiators of the transational project – supported by the secretary of the government noe castañon leon and authoridities of the chilon town council. manipulating society via the projects of “procampo” (Program of Direct Support for Rural Areas), among others, that if one does not support the government’s project, then one is denied assistance. what a shame that their ambition has turned them ignorant and into cowards who do not defend their lands, which are an inheritance from our ancestors. even so, the government created a web page to be able to organize political party groups and groups such as OPDIC (“Organization for the Defense of Indigenous and Campesino Rights”), CENPI (WHAT IS THIS?), ORCAO (Regional Organization of Coffee-Growers of Ocosingo), Green Ecologist Party of Mexico (PVEM), and the colosio foundation, who tries to pass itself of as the “other civil [society]”, when their true identity is that of secret paramilitaries created by this bad corrupt government in order to manipulate the truth and try to end our [struggles] of dignified men and women defending these lands that our ancestors left for us. because of all this, 5 compas are imprisoned and kidnapped by the bad, corrupt, traitor government. may the government never confuse us with its lackeys and ambitious collaborators, and may mr. fancisco question his actions by asking himself the question: “who is the true murderer” and to which he will receive the response “Me?” since the media are controlled by the government, it would be “inconvenient” for the government if they reported on the true situation – that the indigenous people have defended their lands and that the government is holding hostage 5 of our compañeros, who are currently in the prison no. 17 at playas Catazaja, chiapas. due to the greed of a certain many lackeys, their family members are suffering, and in the eyes of the government, this is just. you all must know that the law of mexico is the vilest and dirtiest one around. it does not stop to consider that it is wasting so much money on senators and contendors to PROVE this great injustice, the “otra civil” is simply a ladder for the government to use towards its transational projects and in this way continue to maintain its political and economic power to destroy our organization. moreover, it fills us with rage to know that being indigenous peoples we are not able to see the true intentions of the bad government and that if mr. francisco guzman did not have any interest in this conflict, he would have from the beginning accepted it without scoffing at jesuITs or THE religious DEVOTED and would have had a bit of CRITERIA in his speech. knowing that these are sacred things, if i were in his place, i would not have done it. it is not about someone who defends you, but rather someone who gave their life for you. for this reason, compañeros and compañeras from movement for justice in el barrio in new york, and our allies from around the world, we thank you from the bottom of our heart for this great solidarity, for having taken on our suffering and the mexican government’s repression. consequently, we, men, women, children, and elders, will once again ask you, respectfully, to continue organizing solidarity actions to demand the liberation of our compañeros. once they are release, we will immediately inform you via letter. we hope that this message is circulated and will be on guard during this action.
in light of all this:
we demand the following:
_ The immediate and unconditional release of our compañeros, political prisoners.
_ respect for our rights as indigenous peoples and for our right to exercise our self-determination as a people.
_We demand the immediate withdrawal of the police and military forces from agua azul, as they are in our territory.
_We vehemently reject the bad government’s interests of neoliberal projects and privitazation.
_We demand respect for our human rights and we reject the aGGRESSIONS and intimidation that the bad government is exercising against our compañeros adherents to the other campaign
attentively, land and freedom
*****************************************************************************
NACLA: Global Action for Release of Indigenous Zapatista Supporters in Mexico
Apr 22 2011
North American Congress on Latin America (NACLA)
On April 24, the New York based Movement for Justice in El Barrio (MJB) will launch several days of global action calling for the release of five indigenous Zapatista supporters, who are being held by the Mexican police in the state of Chiapas. The “Bachajón 5,” as they are called, were arrested on February 3 when approximately 300 state police raided a meeting of indigenous Zapatista supporters in San Sebastian Bachajón, Chiapas. One hundred and seventeen people were arrested. After intense international pressure, all were released but the “Bachajón 5,” who are facing serious charges; one is accused of murder, one of attempted murder, and all five are accused of “crimes against the peace.
Human rights organizations have called the arrests, intimidation and imprisonment a fabricated conflict to strip the community, particularly the Zapatistas, of their territorial rights.
“The State did not intervene to prevent confrontations. Instead, it planned a strategy for territorial control in the zone,” the Center for Human Rights Fray Bartholome de las Casas in Chiapas, Mexico told reporter Kristin Bricker. “Territory is an essential element of a dignified life and the clear exercise of indigenous peoples’ collective rights run contrary to the business interests that the federal and state government have promised to private investors. Projects that benefit Mexican and foreign investors and cause poverty and death for residents.”
The Mexican government is looking to develop the region with many, potentially massive, multinational ecotourism projects. Bachajón, where the arrests took place, is located near the popular tourist destination of Agua Azul and the Mayan archeological site Palenque. According to leaked government documents, reported by Bricker, “the government plans to have multinational corporations build a multi-million dollar ecotourism hotel on indigenous land.”
The leaked “Palenque-Agua Azul Waterfalls Development Strategy” PowerPoint, which was prepared by a U.S. consulting firm, argues:
“The state and local government need to ensure that tourists that visit Chiapas and Palenque feel safe and protected. The Zapatista movement is still strongly associated with Chiapas . . . Many of those unfamiliar with the region still consider Chiapas to be unsafe . . . The state needs to protect the developers and hotel operators against the perception of political instability . . . Before attracting investments, the state must resolve land acquisition and access problems. The acquisition of lands adjacent to the waterfalls is vital.”
Earlier this month, the MJB called for the first “5 Days of Action for the Bachajón 5.”
However, on April 9 according to the newest MJB communiqué, more than 800 police and military officers again descended on the community. They violently displaced community members from Bachajón in order to control transportation in and out of the area. Three more people were disappeared.
According to anonymous first-hand testimony from one arrested member of the Bachajón 5, the prison conditions are deplorable:
“They only give us food and scarce amounts of water once a day, and we have gotten sick due to the horrible food that they give us. They do not provide any medication. And when our relatives visit us, they deny us the food that they have brought for us, and they force them to remove their clothing in order to be searched.”
From abroad, MJB—a member of the Otra Campaña and largely composed of Mexican migrants—has been leading the international fight to free the “Bachajón 5.”
The following is an excerpt from the April 10, 2011 MJB communiqué:
It is clear that all of these acts of aggression were provoked by the organized resistance of the people of Bachajón and by the national and international pressure that we generated via our solidarity actions during the “Worldwide Day of Action for the Liberation of the Political Prisoners of San Sebastian Bachajón” and “5 Days of Worldwide Action for the Bachajón 5.”
In agreement with this account, a letter recently released by the World Organization Against Torture (OMCT), headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, confirms that
“it is feared that the threats and acts of harassment they are suffering are the result of the solidarity actions which are taking place in support of the prisoners, in particular those of the campaign ’5 Days of Worldwide Action for the Bachajón 5′ which were held between the 1st and 5th of April 2011.”
In spite of the numerous threats and harassment, in spite of all the hordes of anti-riot helicopters and vans, our sisters and brothers of San Sebastián Bachajón have not given up. Rather, they are advancing in their struggle.
For this reason, we cannot give up either. We must not rest until our 5 brothers are in complete freedom and until the Bachajón community’s just demands are respected.
As such, we propose the following:
1) That we anticipate and remain vigilant for anything that happens. Likewise, that we be prepared to organize immediate, emergency actions if the bad government inflicts any form of violence upon the ejidatatri@s of San Sebastian Bachajón during the following weeks.
2) That we unite our forces once again to realize “5 MORE Days of Worldwide Action for the Bachajón 5” in order to continue fighting together to free the 5 political prisoners of San Sebastián Bachajón, who are adherents of The Other Campaign, and in support of the struggle for dignity and autonomy that the ejidatari@s of Bachajón are carrying out.
Through our solidarity actions, together, we were able to make echo the true history of the Bachajón people and their struggle to defend their lands and natural resources from the avarice of the multinational corporations and
their political lackeys. Both of whom seek to dispossess the ejidatari@s from their tollbooth in order to seize the natural wealth that exists in the ejido’s territory. (The second video-message on this can be seen at this
link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7YRULc-2cBY)
Each time we come together to denounce and contest the bad government and neoliberalism that do all of this simply to accumulate more wealth, we create inalterable cracks in the walls of the prison that confines our five brothers. Now more than ever, we must continue to apply pressure so that these cracks turn into dust.
Once more, we invite each one of you, from every part of the world, in your own way, to realize actions to demand that the PRD governor and repressor Juan Sabines Guerrero immediately release each one of the five political prisoners.
We propose that together we join forces by organizing actions–from our respective locations and different forms of struggle—such as demonstrations, marches, informative street actions, flyering, public forums, theater, teach-ins, and any other activity to bring about:
“5 MORE Days of Worldwide Action for the Bachajón 5” from April 24th to the 28th.
We ask that you please let us know as soon as possible, if you accept our proposal and will participate. You may contact us via e-mail at:
movimientoporjusticiadelbarrio@yahoo.com
We send you embraces of love and solidarity.
From El Barrio, NYC
Movement for Justice in El Barrio
The Other Campaign New York
*******************************************************************************
Community’s Response to 2nd Call for 5 days of Action
SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON EJIDO, ADHERENTS TO THE OTHER CAMPAIGN OF THE SIXTH DECLARACION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE. CHIAPAS, MEXICO.
APRIL 21, 2011
COMPAÑEROS AND COMPAÑERAS.
ADHERENTS TO THE OTHER CAMPAIGN, MOVEMENT FOR JUSTICE IN EL BARRIO OF NEW YORK, AND ALL YOUR ALLIES OF THE WORLD.
FROM THE MEN AND WOMEN OF SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON ADHERENTS TO THE OTHER CAMPAIGN
WE SEND YOU CORDIAL AND FRATERNAL GREETINGS
COMPAÑEROS Y COMPAÑERAS, DUE TO THE 5 MORE DAYS OF ACTION THAT YOU CALLED FOR IN ORDER TO DEMAND THE LIBERATION OF OUR 5 IMPRISONED COMPAÑEROS, WE WANT TO INFORM YOU AND AT THE SAME TIME THANK YOU FOR ALL OF YOUR GREAT SUPPORT AND FOR THE SOLIDARITY OF THE OTHER COMPAÑEROS FROM AROUND THE WORLD, SINCE WE, THE MEN AND WOMEN OF SAN SEBASTIAN BACHAJON, WILL REALIZE A FAST AND PRAYER FOR THE ACTIVITY THAT WILL BE CARRIED OUT, DUE TO THE FACT THAT THE GOVERNMENT IS DEMONSTRATING THE CLEAR INTENTION TO DISPOSSESS US OF OUR LANDS BY MILITARIZING OUR COMMUNITIES WITH THE PRESENCE OF THE ARMY AND NAVY AS IF THIS WERE A WAR ZONE. IN REALITY IT IS ONLY INDIGENOUS PEOPLES WHO ARE RESISTING THE REPRESSION AND DISPLACEMENT, WITH THE VIOLENCE COMING FROM THE GOVERNMENT, THE BEST WEAPON WE HAVE IS OUR WORDS. THE TRUTH IS WHAT UNSETTLES THE GOVERNMENT. FOR THIS REASON, WE ASK YOU TO CONTINUE SUPPORTING US UNTIL WE ACHIEVE THE LIBERATION OF OUR 5 IMPRISONED COMPAÑEROS.
THAT IS ALL FOR TODAY, COMPAS. GREETINGS FROM THE SOUTH OF CHIAPAS.
IT IS WORTH IT. LOVE AND PEACE
ATTENTIVELY
LAND AND FREEDOM
******************************************************************************
Threats to arrest people who support the adherents to the Other Campaign in Chiapas
Hermann Bellinghausen
La Jornada
Tuesday April 12, 2011
San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas. April 11.
‘Official’ groups of government supporters from the ejido San Sebastian Bachajón (municipality of Chilon) have been threatening, according to the ejidatarios who are adherents to the Other Campaign, to “take” human rights defenders and people who come to show solidarity. Although the lawyers for the five indigenous prisoners have not ceased to work on their defence, doing so puts them at risk. Not long ago, [human rights] defenders from the Chiapas coast were imprisoned for doing their work.
This [risk] applies also to civilian observers and supporters of the Other Campaign, and to the media, both alternative and commercial, and potentially even to the tourists, many of whom flock to the resort, in greater numbers now, as a holiday period approaches. The threats are justified [by the official groups] on the grounds that these “foreigners” could be the cause of the “problem.”
Similar threats have been circulating in recent times in Mitzitón, another community belonging to the Other Campaign that resists road and tourist projects designed by the government and private investors. In Bachajón this is happening in the context of the current police occupation of some sites, which began on February 2nd, and has been growing since the 8th of February, with the intervention of hundreds of police and military forces to retake the tollbooth for tourists in San Sebastian – briefly recovered the previous day by the communal farmers of the Other Campaign who originally built it – which gives access to the waterfalls of the neighbouring ejido of Agua Azul (Tumbalá), which also has its own tollbooth.
In various ongoing conflicts or community problems related to support bases of the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN) or the Other Campaign, a pattern stands out, both one of hostility and aggression from ‘official’ groups towards autonomous ones, and one of clear state intervention, whether repressive, social or political.
The counterinsurgency strategy is not new, it is just evolving and becoming even more evident. In San Sebastian it has been discovered that former adherents of the Other Campaign, who left the resistance in recent times, have privileges and state protection far greater than that granted to other groups affiliated to the government and political parties.
*******************************************************************************
Call for a new campaign “5 MORE days of Worldwide Action for the Bachajón 5″
10th April 2011
The Movement for Justice in El Barrio is making an urgent new call to action for 5 more days of worldwide action in support of the five remaining political prisoners from San Sebastian Bachajón. The new days of action will be the 24th to the 28th April 2011.
On the morning of 8th April the compas from San Sebastian Bachajón regained control of the tollbooth situated in their lands which marks the entrance to the waterfalls of Agua Azul. This was another step for them towards building their autonomy.
The following day, 9th April, over 800 state and federal police and troops violently evicted them. Following this act of repression by the bad government, 3 of the Other Campaign supporters disappeared. Once again the government shows violence, brutality and repression. When the humble and simple people organise autonomously towards dignity and against displacement, the bad government responds with aggression and injustice.
Our 5 compañeros Jerónimo Guzmán Méndez, Domingo Perez Alvaro, Domingo García Gómez, Juan Aguilar Guzmán and Mariano Demeza Silvano remain political prisoners, hostages of the state, in horrible conditions. They sent us a very moving letter recently, describing their daily reality. This affected us deeply and inspired us to continue struggling for their freedom. They are given food only once a day, with very little water. They are becoming ill as a result, but are given no medicines. They are not allowed to have the food brought for them by their families. They are forced to do ‘humiliating’ daily work, and are threatened with being put in the punishment cell.
It is clear that all these acts of aggression are the result of the organised resistance of the people of Bachajon, and of the national and international pressure resulting from all our solidarity actions. “The bad government are repressing us and continuing to pressurise us to hand over our lands and natural resources”. The World Organisation Against Torture
(OMCT) wrote recently in a letter that it feared that the threats and acts of violence and repression by the government were due to the actions of solidarity realised in support of the prisoners.
In spite of everything our brothers and sisters of San Sebastian Bachajón continue to resist, and continue to move forward in their struggle. We also must not give up. We must not rest until our 5 brothers are free and the just demands of the community of Bachajón are respected.
We therefore propose:
1) That we remain alert and watchful, ready for emergency protests against any acts of violence committed by the bad government against the ejidatarios.
2) That we organise 5 more days of worldwide action for the Bachajon 5, for freedom for the prisoners and in support of the dignified struggle of the people of Bachajon to defend their lands and natural resources against the rapacious greed of multinational corporations and their political lackeys who want to take over the natural wealth of the territory of the ejido. These days of action to take place on the 24th to 28th April 2011.
Movement for Justice in El Barrio, the Other Campaign, New York
*******************************************************************************
World Organisation against Torture (OMCT) expresses concerns about 5 indigenous Tzeltal prisoners in Chiapas
They report that four of them complained of harassment by the authorities, who threatened to send them to a punishment cell.
Hermann Bellinghausen
Published: 04/07/2011
Mexico, DF. The International Secretariat of the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT) spoke in Geneva, Switzerland, of their concerns for the five Tzeltal campesino prisoners in Chiapas, including a minor, inhabitants of the ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón (municipality of Chilon) and denounced the deplorable conditions the prisoners are enduring.
They stated that the four adults, Jerome Guzman Mendez, Domingo Pérez Alvaro, Juan Aguilar Guzmán and Domingo García Gómez – incarcerated in the National Centre for Social Reinsertion of the Sentenced (Cereso) number 17 (municipality of Playas de Catazajá) – “complained of harassment from the governor”, who threatened to send them to “a punishment cell”.
The OMCT continued: “It is feared that the threats and acts of harassment may be a result of the solidarity actions that are being undertaken in support of the prisoners, in particular the campaign ‘5 Days of Worldwide Action for the Bachajón 5’, which took place between the 1st and 5th of April”. The agency added that the detainees “are forced to perform demeaning jobs for refusing to pay the fee to the ‘selfgovernment’ of the detention centre and to defend their right to dignified treatment”.
The minor, Demeza Mariano Silvano, remains in the Villa Crisol Special Detention Centre for Adolescents (municipality of Berriozábal), because the office of the state procurator of justice set bail of 22 thousand pesos (1,300 euros), a sum that his family “cannot pay”.
The International Secretariat of the OMCT condemned “all violations of human rights” in the case, “including the lack of respect for due process, of the right to the presumption of innocence and to due judicial protection” for the ejidatarios who were arrested in February.
The OMCT also expressed their concern for the safety and physical and psychological integrity of these people, and urged state and federal authorities to guarantee these. On the other hand, they urged those authorities to release Demeza Silvano, who is still detained under the same charges that the other ejidatarios, who were subsequently released, were accused of. The Mexican government must “comply with its obligations in respect of fundamental rights at the international and regional level”. In this case, they urged the government “to act in accordance with the Convention on the Rights of the Child”.
The international organization recognizes the existence of a conflict between the ejidatarios, who are adherents to the Other Campaign, and the government of Chiapas, about the management and exploitation of the natural resources found in the ejido of San Sebastian. On the 6th of February, the Chiapas government announced the start of a process of dialogue, in which the ejidatarios and Other Campaign adherents declined to participate.
*****************************************************************************
SAN SEBASTIÁN BACHAJÓN EJIDO, ADHERENTS TO THE OTHER CAMPAIGN, THE SIXTH DECLARATION OF THE LACANDON JUNGLE
CHIAPAS, MEXICO. 5 APRIL 2011.
TO THE COMPAÑERAS AND COMPAÑEROS OF THE NEW YORK OTHER CAMPAIGN, MOVEMENT FOR JUSTICE IN EL BARRIO.
TO THE NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL COMPAÑERAS AND COMPAÑEROS ADHERENTS TO THE OTHER CAMPAIGN AND TO ALL OF THE ALLIES FROM OTHER COUNTRIES
COMPAÑEROS AND COMPAÑERAS
MOVEMENT FOR JUSTICE IN EL BARRIO OF NEW YORK –
WARM GREETINGS FROM SAN SEBASTIÁN BACHAJÓN
Compañeras and compañeros, by way of the following, we want to thank you for these 5 Days of Action that you have realized in solidarity with our imprisoned compañeros and thank all the other compañeros from other countries who joined in this noble cause, since we as indigenous people suffer greatly the injustices of the bad government of Juan Sabines Guerrero. He currently mistreats our unjustly imprisoned compañeros by forcing them to work sunrise to sunset, and threatening them with worse confinement if they do not obey his orders of forced work. For this reason, we wish to make you aware that this bad government has taken additional repressive measures to pressure us into handing over our lands and resources to them. It fills us with courage to know that you are demonstrating such great heart to continue exposing this bad state and federal government’s neoliberal interests and its continued violation of our rights as men and women who wish to build a just form of autonomy for everyone.
Compañeras and compañeros:
Thank you for everything and we will remain in contact to be better prepared for all the repression that the government will exercise against our imprisoned compañeros.
Attentively:
Land and Freedom!
Zapata Lives, the Struggle Continues!
Until Victory, Always!
Long live the Compañeros and Compañeras of New York, Adherents of the Other Campaign, and Their Allies!
******************************************************************************
Indigenous Zapatista Supporters “Held Hostage” in Chiapas for Opposing Ecotourism Project
Written by Kristin Bricker
Tuesday, 29 March 2011
This past February 3, approximately 300 state police raided a meeting of indigenous Zapatista supporters in San Sebastian Bachajón, Chiapas, and arrested 117 people. The arrests sparked protests across Mexico and in front of Mexican consulates around the world, leading the Chiapas government to release the majority of the prisoners. However, five Tzeltal indigenous men, who are now known as the “Bachajón 5,” remain behind bars. One is accused of murder, another is accused of attempted murder, and all five are accused of crimes against the peace.
The Bachajón Zapatista supporters are adherents to the Other Campaign, which was initiated by the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN) in order to form national and global alliances amongst leftist organizations and movements.
The arrests stem from a confrontation between rival indigenous groups that occurred the previous day in San Sebastian Bachajón, which is an ejido, or communally held lands. Marcos García Moreno, an ejido member who belonged to the faction that allied itself with the government, was shot and killed during the confrontation with ejido members who are Other Campaign adherents. The government accuses the Other Campaign adherents of murdering García Moreno and attempting to murder a second man who was shot during the confrontation. The Other Campaign adherents deny the charges. They say they were unarmed, and that the government-allied ejido members were shooting guns into the air during the confrontation.
The government has attempted to paint the conflict as a dispute between rival indigenous factions over control of a tollbooth that charges a fee to enter the Agua Azul waterfalls, one of Chiapas’ most popular tourist attractions. However, the Bachajón adherents and their lawyers at the Fray Bartolome de las Casas Human Rights Center (“Frayba”) say that they have proof that the tollbooth confrontation was designed to provoke government intervention and police occupation of the region. The Bachajón adherents argue that the government orchestrated the confrontation at the tollbooth “as a pretext to take over the Agua Azul Waterfalls Ecotourism Center for its transnational interests and projects.”
According to leaked government documents provided by Frayba, the government plans to have multinational corporations build a multi-million dollar ecotourism hotel on indigenous land. The leaked “Palenque-Agua Azul Waterfalls Development Strategy” Powerpoint, which was prepared by a United States consulting firm, argues:
“The state and local government need to ensure that tourists that visit Chiapas and Palenque feel safe and protected. The Zapatista movement is still strongly associated with Chiapas… Many of those unfamiliar with the region still consider Chiapas to be unsafe… The state needs to protect the developers and hotel operators against the perception of political instability… Before attracting investments, the state must resolve land acquisition and access problems. The acquisition of lands adjacent to the waterfalls is vital…”
Bolom Ajaw, a small community founded by Zapatistas after the 1994 uprising, is located directly across the river from the proposed hotel. The San Sebastian Bachajón ejido, home to a few hundred Other Campaign adherents and Zapatista supporters, is located just outside of Agua Azul. The highway that leads to the Agua Azul waterfalls cuts through the Bachajón ejido. A proposed freeway included in the Palenque-Agua Azul Waterfalls Development Strategy would cut through Bachajón and Bolom Ajaw.
History of the Agua Azul Conflict
Prior to 1994, the lands around the Agua Azul waterfalls were ranches owned by rich men and worked by underpaid and poorly treated indigenous peasants. When the Zapatistas rose up in arms in 1994, 96 of those indigenous peasants ran off the rich ranchers and took over the land they had worked for generations. As a result, Zapatistas and their supporters control much of the land in and around what is now the Agua Azul nature reserve.
In 2001, the Mexican government demonstrated that it would not honor its commitments under the San Andres Accords, which, if implemented, would have granted autonomy to Mexico’s indigenous peoples. In response, the EZLN began to unilaterally implement the San Andres Accords. It began to redistribute unoccupied recuperated lands to landless Zapatistas from other areas, such as the families who founded Bolom Ajaw—located next to the Agua Azul waterfalls.
In 2000, the Chiapas governor offered individual land titles to any peasant who occupied recuperated lands. The Zapatistas interpreted the offer as an attempt to divide the collectivized lands and bring recuperated territory back into the government’s sphere of control, and they rejected the land titles. However, many indigenous peasants who benefited from the uprising but were not Zapatistas did title their lands, causing divisions within the communities.
Around this time, non-Zapatista indigenous peasants, such as those who now belong to the Organization for the Defense of Indigenous and Peasant Rights (OPDDIC), took advantage of the diminished government repression of land takeovers, and they began to occupy lands close to the Agua Azul waterfalls. OPDDIC is a Chiapan paramilitary organization that the government officially granted non-profit status. “Little by little [OPDDIC] amplified [its territory] in a disproportionate manner until they began to border the Zapatistas’ parcels, and [then] they began to invade,” Frayba explains. “First [OPDDIC invaded] seven hectares of cultivated land, and later the Bolom Ajaw waterfalls reserve, with the intention of being beneficiaries of the tourism projects that are planned for that territory.”
Divisions in the indigenous communities worsened as the government began to offer “development” projects to peasants who allied themselves with the government, as is the case with the Agua Azul Tzeltal Indigenous Ecotourism Cooperative (Ecoturismo Indígena Tzeltal de Cascadas de Agua Azul S.C. de R.L.), which is affiliated with OPDDIC and operates the Agua Azul waterfalls tourist area with the help of generous government subsidies. OPDDIC, members of the Agua Azul Ecotourism Cooperative, and local indigenous peasants affiliated with the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI, one of the most powerful political parties in Mexico) have carried out armed attacks on the Bolom Ajaw Zapatistas in attempts to drive them off their land. The most recent attack occurred in February 2010, when OPDDIC ambushed Zapatistas who were attempting to retake Bolom Ajaw farmland that OPDDIC occupied the month before. The confrontation resulted in one dead OPDDIC member, whom Zapatistas say was hit by friendly fire as the OPDDIC surrounded Bolom Ajaw and opened fire from various points in the community.
Divisions amongst residents of the Agua Azul area have led to disagreements over how tourism proceeds are spent. As a result, Other Campaign adherents and pro-government ejido members are engaged in a constant battle over the right to charge admission into the Agua Azul tourist area. The tollbooth has changed hands several times, and often, tourists must pay separate entrance fees to different peasant organizations in order to enter Agua Azul. In 2009, Chiapas state police raided the Other Campaign-controlled tollbooth and gave pro-government peasants the right to charge admission. Later that year, the Other Campaign re-took the tollbooth. This past February, in the events leading up to the February 3 mass arrest of Other Campaign adherents, local PRI members attempted to once again take control of the tollbooth.
Showdown in Agua Azul
On February 1, 2011, Bolom Ajaw residents noticed two helicopters flying low over their community. The helicopters were white with red and green stripes, although witnesses could not discern who the helicopters belonged to. The witnesses’ description matches the Air Force helicopter that President Felipe Calderón used that same day to visit Chiapan tourist destinations that are under development by the federal Secretary of Tourism (FONATUR). Calderón visited Palenque, where FONATUR wants to build an integrated tourist center (which includes the proposed hotel in Agua Azul) and a freeway that would cut straight through San Sebastián Bachajón and Bolom Ajaw.
On February 2—one day after the helicopter flyby in Bolom Ajaw—sixty local PRI members take over the Bachajón tollbooth in a surprise early morning raid. The PRI group was led by Carmen Aguilar Gómez, former leader of the Regional Organization Ocosingo Café Growers (ORCAO), one of the peasant organizations that broke its agreement with the EZLN and legalized recuperated lands.
Following the attack, the Bachajón adherents regroup, and at 2:30pm, 150 of them attempt to retake the tollbooth. “We were armed with sticks and machetes,” one of them told Frayba. “No one carried firearms.” According to Bachajón adherents who participated in the action, the PRI members began to fire their guns into the air. The adherents pushed forward, and when they arrived at the tollbooth, the PRI members fled. An hour and a half later, state police arrived on the scene, accompanied by Carmen Aguilar and several other leaders of the PRI group. The police told the adherents that a PRI member had been murdered and they took over the tollbooth. The zone is now heavily occupied by state police.
On February 3, state police interrupted a meeting of Bachajón adherents to the Other Campaign. A commander asked if they agreed to a three-way dialogue with the government and the PRI ejido members. When the adherents responded that they would not participate in the dialogue, the police arrested 117 people who were in attendance at the meeting.
On February 5, the government released 107 prisoners and filed charges against the remaining ten.
Manufactured Conflict
The Fray Bartolome de las Casas Human Rights Center, whose lawyers are defending the Bachajón 5, insists that the confrontation at the Agua Azul tollbooth is part of the government’s strategy to strip indigenous Chiapans of their territorial rights. “Territory as an essential element of a dignified life and the clear exercise of indigenous peoples’ collective rights run contrary to the business interests that the federal and state government have promised to private investors. Projects that benefit Mexican and foreign investors and cause poverty and death for residents,” argues Frayba. In Agua Azul, “the State did not intervene to prevent confrontations. Instead, it planned a strategy for territorial control in the zone.”
In addition to the previously mentioned leaked Powerpoint presentation in which a private consulting firm identifies the Zapatistas as problematic for Chiapas’ tourism industry and argues that the “acquisition” of their land next to the Agua Azul waterfalls is “vital,” Frayba says that an informant has told them about secret meetings between the government and PRI ejido members. According to Frayba, “Since March 2010, officials from the Chiapas General Government Secretariat—including Secretary Noé Castañón León—public officials, political operators, police officials, and pro-government ejido members have held a series of meetings in which they designed a plan for territorial control of Agua Azul.” Carmen Aguilar Gómez, who led the February 2 attack on the tollbooth, was present at the meetings.
According to Frayba’s informant, who was present during the meetings, participants agreed on a plan that would result in the government purchasing $20 million pesos ($1.7 million dollars) of land from the pro-government ejido members in order to build the Agua Azul hotel. The informant says that the government told the ejido members present “to look for people in the region who have land titles.”
The Bachajón Other Campaign adherents were specifically mentioned in the meetings. The government “mentioned that from this moment on they [the pro-government ejido members] would be safe,” reports the informant. “Because the Other Campaign adherents were being pursued for being criminals that the Fray Bartolomé Human Rights Center was protecting.” In a later meeting, the informant says, they agreed that “together they would find a way to take down the Other Campaign.”
The conspirators decided to use the contested tollbooth to set their plan in motion. “The plan was that the organizations would clash so that the government would intervene and take over the tollbooth.” The ejido members investigated how many people they had to carry out a raid on the tollbooth, and how many people the Other Campaign could possibly mobilize to defend it. Then the government and the ejido members agreed on a date when the pro-government ejido members would take over the tollbooth. According to the informant, “Noé Castañón asked [the ejido members] if the majority of their group was in agreement to take over the tollbooth, and they said yes, even if they had to give their lives.”
The government’s behavior following the February 2 incident at the tollbooth appears to corroborate the informant’s testimony. On February 6, the state government held an “Agua Azul Ecotourism Center Dialogue and Coordination,” which was billed as a negotiation to resolve the conflict. Representatives from the Agua Azul and San Sebastian Bachajón attended the Dialogue, creating the appearance of an actual dialogue between conflicting parties. However, the representatives were all pro-government ejido members because the Other Campaign adherents refused to participate. Amongst the “agreements” that came out of the Dialogue are the following:
“At the communities’ request, the police will have a permanent presence.”
“Frayba will not be permitted to participate [in negotiations], because it only exhorts violence and divides the communities.”
The second point of “agreement” is particularly troubling because the Dialogue purports to address territorial control over indigenous lands, but it explicitly excludes the Bachajón adherents’ lawyers.
According to the Bachajón 5, they are being held “hostage by the state government, as a way of forcing us to accept their ecotourism project and end the Other Campaign organization on the ejido.” They say they have received several visits from government officials who have pressured them to sign on to the Agua Azul Ecotourism Center Dialogue and Coordination “agreement.” Domingo Pérez Álvaro, accused of attempted murder, says that during the confrontation at the tollbooth, he was in a meeting with José Manuel Morales, a government official from Ocosingo, Chiapas, with whom he was attempting to negotiate an agreement over the tollbooth. Morales visited Pérez Álvaro in prison and reportedly told him, “If you sign the agreement, I will say that you were with me, and the charges will go away.”
Global Solidarity
Mobilizations have occurred around the globe in support of the Bachajón prisoners. Movement for Justice in El Barrio (MJB, a New York tenants rights organization and fellow Other Campaign adherent) declared this past March 7 to be a Worldwide Day of Action for the Liberation of the Political Prisoners of San Sebastian Bachajón. That day, protests occurred around Mexico and in ten other countries in support of Bachajón.
In an attempt to prevent the protests, the government freed five of the prisoners just before the Worldwide Day of Action. The government-funded Chiapas State Human Rights Commission (CEDH) says that it personally informed the Bachajón adherents that the men had been released in the hopes that it would prevent a highway blockade outside of Agua Azul. Because five of their comrades were still in jail, the Bachajón adherents went forward with the March 7 blockade. In response, the CEDH issued a statement criticizing the Bachajón adherents: “The incident that occurred today, in which the highway in front of the Agua Azul Waterfalls tourist center was blocked, worries this Council because these acts could provoke conflict amongst the region’s inhabitants and cause damage to third parties who are uninvolved in the conflict.”
The CEDH says that the five men now known as the “Bachajón 5” remain in prison because they tested positive on a gunpowder residue test. Its press release does not mention the fact that the men were detained the day after the confrontation at the tollbooth, and that the gunpowder residue test was performed two days later, on February 4. Furthermore, the men’s lawyers argue that they were not provided with adequate interpreters during their detention and interrogation. Instead of providing a qualified Tzeltal-Spanish interpreter, Palenque police officers interpreted during the interrogation.
MJB is keeping up the pressure to release the remaining five prisoners. The group has called for “5 Days of Worldwide Action for the Bachajón 5” on April 1-5 to demand the release of the remaining prisoners. MJB proposes that during the 5 Days of Worldwide Action for the Bachajón 5, “we unite our forces and organize actions–from our particular locations and respective forms of struggle–such as demonstrations, marches, informative street actions, flyering, public forums, theatre, teach-ins, and any other activity.”
From the Prisoners
PLAYAS DE CATAZAJA, CHIAPAS
28 MARCH 2011
PRISON NO. 17
To the adherents of the Other Campaign – National and International
To the National and International Civil Organizations
To National and International Human Rights Defenders
To the compañeros of The Other Campaign of New York, Movement for Justice in El Barrio
Subject: Public Announcement
By way of the following, we thank the compañeros for the solidarity and the support that you all, from your respective locations and countries, have manifested for our immediate release. We hope that you will continue supporting us with other actions, may you not grow weary in supporting us. We, too, from this prison, will continue to fight to defend our lands.
We send you an embrace and energy, compañeros in this struggle! Until victory, always. Land, freedom.
ATTENTIVELY
JUAN AGUILAR GUZMAN
JERONIMO GUZMAN MENDEZ
DOMINGO GARCIA GOMEZ
DOMINGO PEREZ ALVARO
MARIANO DEMEZA SILVANO
POLITICAL PRISONERS!
Convocation for the “5 Days of Worldwide Action for the Bachajón 5”
To our sisters and brothers of the Ejido of San Sebastian Bachajón:
To our Zapatista sisters and brothers:
To our compañer@s of The Other Campaign:
To our compañer@s of the Zezta Internazional:
To the adherents of the International Campaign in Defense of El Barrio
and our allies across the world:
To the civil society in Mexico and the world:
Movement for Justice in El Barrio calls for –
“5 Days of Worldwide Action for the Bachajón 5”
From April 1 – 5, 2011.
Receive embraces of affection and solidarity on behalf of Movement for Justice in El Barrio. We wish to share with you a proposal on behalf of the simple and humble immigrant community of El Barrio, New York. Once more we would like to ask that we come together to realize the “5 Days of Worldwide Action for the Bachajón 5” to contribute to the liberation of the 5 political prisoners of The Other Campaign of San Sebastián Bachajón.
In these days which we find ourselves mourning and fearing a nuclear tragedy, provoked in large part by the capitalists’ unbridled greed, it remains clear now more than ever that only the organized actions of autonomous communities will be able to resist the destruction, wars, and massive tragedies that the multinational corporations, bankers, and owners of big business, aided by the bad governments, continue to provoke. Organized support is also another source of energy – the “other” energy that is needed to counteract these disasters.
Organized resistance from below is the only solution to save the planet and the governments that are at the businesses’ disposal know this as well. For this reason, the bad governments attack those who fight in an organized way against the capitalist system. Such has been the case with the autonomous community of San Sebastián Bachajón (you may view the first video-message from them at this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dcTspD7NKmY ).
While there is no guarantee that the federal and state governments will cease obeying the mandates of the multinationals, the community of San Sebastián Bachajón will defend its land and energy sources, protecting them from the destruction and ecological disequilibrium
that the transnational corporations create wherever they go.
The bad governments know this, and thus, continue to keep the five political prisoners of San Sebastián Bachajón imprisoned. “We are only held prisoners in exchange for our lands,” decry the illegally arrested compañeros. They also denounce that governmental
representatives have visited them repeatedly in their confinement to get them to concede to a dialogue without any guarantees, as it is but a pretext to take over the territory where the ejido’s toll booth and access to the Agual Azul waterfalls are located. In addition, during a
recent manifestation organized by our sisters and brothers of San Sebastián Bachajón in resistance, they were harassed by police helicopters and “preventive” police vans.
The liberation of five political prisoners, which was secured thanks to the actions of our sisters and brothers of San Sebastián Bachajón and national and international pressures, has brought us much joy. We are very pleased as well by the amount of support on behalf of so many different organizations and collectives from across the world that joined our last call for worldwide action: From México to South Africa, from Austria to Argentina, and in France, Scotland, Morocco, Puerto Rico, Edinburgh, Philippines, Dorset, England, Germany, Madrid,
Colombia, Barcelona, and here in New York! We are certain that it was thanks to you all and to the constant work of the independent, autonomous, and free media that they are now not in some jail in Chiapas. Nevertheless, five brothers remain unjustly detained.
For this reason, we are calling for
“5 Days of Worldwide Action for the Bachajón 5”
We invite each and every one of you, in your own way and place, to organize actions during April 1 – 5 to demand that the repressive governor Juan Sabines Guerrero free all of the five political prisoners.
We propose that we unite our forces and organize actions – from our particular locations and respective forms of struggle – such as demonstrations, marches, informative street actions, flyering, public forums, theatre, teach-ins, and any other activity to realize
“5 Days of Worldwide Action for the Bachajón 5”
In these times of tragedies, which nothing can resist, we know that we must support organized resistance. We look forward to your support.
We ask that you please let us know as soon as possible if you accept our proposal and will participate. You may contact us via e-mail at: movimientoporjusticiadelbarrio@yahoo.com
Justice, Land, and Freedom for the Ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón!
Free the Political Prisoners of San Sebastián Bachajón!
Long live the women of San Sebastián Bachajón!
Stop the Aggressions against Adherents of The Other Campaign!
Long live the Zapatistas!
We send you embraces of love and solidarity.
From El Barrio, NYC
Movement for Justice in El Barrio
The Other Campaign New York
4 adherents to the Other Campaign are released
Elio Henríquez
La Jornada
Sunday March 6, 2011
San Cristobal de las Casas, Chiapas, March 5
Following the withdrawal of criminal prosecution by the State Prosecutor (PGJE), between Wednesday and Saturday four of the ten indigenous adherents to the Other Campaign have been released. [They were] arrested on 3rd February, at the tourist centre at the Agua Azul waterfalls, after a clash with ejidatarios, members of the PRI, from San Sebastian Bachajón in the municipality of Chilon, which left one dead and two wounded.
Unofficial sources said that Pedro Garcia Alvarado, who reportedly has learning difficulties, and who was accused of crimes, damages and attacks in breach of the peace of the community, was released on Wednesday night. They adeed that between Thursday and Saturday, Alvaro Miguel Deara, Pedro Hernández López and Miguel López Deara were also released
One of the six who are still in prison, Mariano Demeza Silvano, who is less than 17 years of age, was on Friday set bail of 22 thousand pesos to be released. It is likely that, in the coming days or weeks, the other five who are currently in the prison located in the municipality of Playas de Catazaja, in the north of Chiapas, may be released, said the sources.
In this context, the Fray Bartolome de las Casas Human Rights Centre reported that the communal landholders of San Sebastian Bachajon, adherents to the Other Campaign, filed an injunction against the construction of the tollbooth that is being built by the state government, through the secretaries of Infrastructure and Treasury, saying that they signed an agreement on the 13th February “illegally and arbitrarily, since the assembly was not consulted”
Ricardo Lagunes, lawyer for the organisation, said that the construction of the tollbooth, which is disputed by two groups of ejidatarios, affects the collective rights of the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón as a community, as an agrarian centre and as indigenous people.
He added that the Seventh District Court will decide on the injunction filed in recent days to suspend immediately the construction in an area of common usage.
SIPAZ: CONCERN FOR VIOLENT ACTS AGAINST SOCIAL MOVEMENTS IN CHIAPAS
URGENT INFORMATIVE BULLETIN – 4 March 2011
The International Service for Peace (SIPAZ) expresses its strong concern regarding the new escalation of violence and repression directed against social movements and human-rights defenders in Chiapas. A communiqué released by the Peace Network on 28 February refers to this “deteriorating context,” noting the “lack of will and/or capacity of the state government to intervene in existing conflicts, avoid addressing them, or even finding short-term ‘solutions’ that, when not realized, results in the repression against groups who oppose its politics.” The recent events in San Sebastián Bachajón, Mitzitón, and Tonalá seem to reflect these tendencies that have exacerbated social polarization and that could lead to consequences that are still even graver.
The acts:
San Sebastián Bachajón – provocation and subsequent administration of the conflict
On 2 February, a day after the ‘private visit’ of President Felipe Calderón to Chiapas to promote the “Year of Tourism” in the state, there was a confrontation between a group of adherents to the Other Campaign and a group linked to the official authorities, both groups being comprised of Tseltal indigenous individuals from the ejido San Sebastián Bachajón. The confrontation arose due to a dispute regarding a control-point at the entrance of the Agua Azul waterfalls and resulted in one death on the official side and several injured.
On 3 February were detained 117 members of the Other Campaign, of which 107 were released on 5 February. The Fray Bartolomé de La Casas Center for Human Rights (CDHFBC), which arrived soon on-scene to document the situation, has indicated that “among the number of irregularities in the legal process [the detained] lacked a defense attorney and official translator and were moreover threatened by state police and harassed by local authorities charged with the administration of justice” (informative bulletin of the CDHFBC, 5 February 2011). In accordance with journalistic information, 7 of the 10 incarcerated did not find themselves at the site of the confrontation when the events occurred. Among these are individuals accused of homicide and the carrying of fire-arms.
In a communiqué, the Center of Indigenous Rights A.C., which has a strong presence in the area, denounced that “having had the possibility of avoiding the confrontation between the ejidatarios of San Sebastián and the ejidatarios who pertain to the Other Campaign, the government took no such action; being on-site to avoid the confrontation between the two groups and the death and severe injuries (of a person from the group of ejidatarios from San Sebastián), it adopted a delaying strategy.”
On 6 February, the government of Chiapas reported on a dialogue-table established between the communities of Agua Azul and San Sebastián Bachajón to reach an agreement regarding the control-point; it nonetheless admitted that the group of adherents to the Other Campaign did not participate in the dialogue. A caravan of women that arrived on 19 February to San Sebastián denounced that “We know that the so-called ‘dialogue-table’ carried out last Sunday, which was attended by governmental authorities and representatives of the official Council of Human Rights of the State, was a shameful celebration that attempted to legitimate the government’s intervention and the looting of the tourist center of Agua Azul from its legitimate possessors, who are unfortunately now divided.” For their part, the 10 prisoners of San Sebastián Bachajón have denounced that they have now been visited on four occasions by state officials offering to have them released in exchange for their participation in the dialogue-table.
Going beyond this, the CDHFBC indicates in its 3 March report “Government creates and administers conflict for territorial control in Chiapas” that there is a “calculated strategy on the part of the state government that has generated a confrontation among actors in the area so as to later intervene as mediator and administrator of the very same conflict.” It stressed moreover that “the state government broke with a process of dialogue that the actors had been engaged in since 2010 with the goal of having it be the residents of the zone who would administer and preserve the natural resources inherited to them by their ancestors.”
*************************************************************************
Chiapas: Caravan of women to San Sebastián Bachajón
February 25, 2011
On Saturday 19 February a caravan departed to the Agua Azul region that was made up of members of different communities and civil and social organizations with the aim of “documenting the situation lived by the comrades, and to see and accompany the comrades of the San Sebastián Bachajón ejido […] and to give a voice to the women, who are affected by the conflict that is lived in the area whose voice would also like to be heard.”
Organized by the Centre for the Rights of Women in Chiapas, the Independent Movement of Women and the Feminist Brigade, together with different civil organizations from Chiapas, they sought to “open a space for women and families that are suffering from the difficulties in Agua Azul and to document the looting by the government and people from the community who are associated with it, beyond continuing to express our solidarity and demanding the release of the 10 comrades who are still unjustly imprisoned.” It should be remembered that on 2 and 3 February 117 ejidatarios from San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents to the Other campaign, were detained following a confrontation. 10 of them were sentenced to imprisonment “for crimes that they did not commit, like kidnapping, injuries, homicide, and damage to communications media and public peace,” while the rest were freed.
The communiqué released by the Caravan stressed that “[t]he violation of autonomy began some time ago with the government’s attempt to construct in Agua Azul a large tourist centre, using transnational capital, that would supposedly benefit the ejidatarios of Agua Azul who form part of the large ejido of San Sebastián Bachajón. The resistance of those who for many generations have taken care of and administered this beautiful space, which is part of their land and territory, has been long and heroic; but the government succeeded in coopting several leaders and destroying the dynamic of internal accords and unity. In collaboration with dissidents and through its dirty measures, it has succeeded in taking over the administration of the place using 3000 signatures that accept its intervention, though most of these signatures are of ejidatarios from other communities of the ejido, not from Agua Azul who do not respond to the historical interests and international rights of the indigenous peoples. We know that the so-called ‘dialogue-table’ carried out last Sunday, which was attended by governmental authorities and representatives of the official Council of Human Rights of the State, was a shameful celebration that attempted to legitimise the government’s intervention and the looting of the tourist centre of Agua Azul from its legitimate possessors, who are unfortunately now divided.”
The communiqué moreover disclosed that “[t]he war that is lived in Chiapas cannot any longer be covered up by promises or by the war on organized crime. The members of this caravan believe that the violation of autonomy of all those who reside in Agua Azul (not only one part of those in conflict) is part of the strategy of war of low intensity implemented by the different levels of state and federal government since 1994 that is now directed against the organized resistance of the Other Campaign, which finds its focus in Agua Azul, Mitzitón, Tila, Chicomuselo, and different territories where the peoples resist in defence of their land and territory.”
Sipaz
************************************************************************
The indigenous: between harassment and dispossession
Luis Hernandez Navarro,
La Jornada, 08/02/2011 (originally published in Spanish)
Seventeen years after the armed uprising in Chiapas and eleven after the signing of the San Andrés accords on indigenous rights and culture, the situation of indigenous peoples throughout the country is worse than ever. There is literally a war of dispossession against their lands and territories.
Throughout Mexico they live under siege. The large mining companies, many of them Canadian, occupy their sacred sites, pollute their water and erode their lands. The government strives to build great dams that will turn their fields into memories and drown their people and their dead. The loggers loot the timber from their forests.
The current economic uncertainty has forced them to migrate more than ever. In the large horticultural fields of the northeast they work as slaves and are poisoned by agrochemicals. In the beaches and the tourist areas, major hotel companies try to evict them from their lands.
Their leaders are harassed, imprisoned and killed. More than 8,000 indigenous people are in prisons throughout the country, mostly through ignorance of the law; they do not have a translator or a lawyer and they have no money for bail. In the whole state of Mexico, the most populous state, there are only 10 interpreters of indigenous languages.
Under the pretext of combating drug trafficking or of campaigns against guns or guerrillas, many indigenous territories are militarized. There is frequent abuse of the civilian population by the troops.
Their appointed municipal authorities are not respected, and their languages are ignored. They experience discrimination everywhere. Their law is not known or understood and their rights are trampled on. They are sentenced using clearly racist criteria.
In 2007, the Organization of American States (OAS) in Washington released a report stating that indigenous people subject to criminal proceedings are usually helpless in the midst of a process they do not understand, because they do not speak Spanish and they have no interpreter. Arbitrary arrest is common, as are excessive periods of detention and lengthy trials. Abuse and torture to obtain a confession are also common practice.
According to the National Human Rights Commission, the most common complaints from indigenous people subject to criminal proceedings concern abuse while in detention, arbitrary arrests without warrants, the entering of their homes without a search warrant, fabrication of evidence, poor and inadequate legal defence, lack of an interpreter and delays.
As if this were not enough, in recent years the double pressure on them has intensified. On the one hand, there are the drug traffickers, who want to use their lands to produce opium and marijuana, or as a transit route. On the other, there is the criminalization of their protests by the state. In many cases the state has criminalised their complaints, their resistance, and the exercise of their freedom of expression and movement, ordering long periods in prison for those allegedly responsible, without evidence. Usually they are accused of attacks on roads, illegal deprivation of freedom (kidnapping) and environmental crimes. The repression is concentrated in Chiapas, Oaxaca and Guerrero.
Among many other factors, two are especially notable, the level of government arbitrariness and the highly political bias of the government repression.
On 2nd February, in the ejido of San Sebastian Bachajon, in the Agua Azul zone, in the state of Chiapas, 117 indigenous people from the Other Campaign were arrested . Nine of them are being held as political prisoners. As recently as March 4, one of the prisoners was released due to the withdrawal of evidence. The conflict was triggered by Noe Castanon, secretary general of the government. The authorities broke up a process of dialogue and community agreement which had been under way since 2010.
On September 27, 2010, in a rigged trial, the mixed ‘court of first instance’, based in Ometepec, Guerrero, sentenced three indigenous people, Matías Silverio, Genaro Cruz and David Valtierra, to three years and two months imprisonment . They falsely accused them of the crime of the deprivation of the liberty of Narciso Garcia, who invaded and sold the common lands of their ejido. The victims are the founders of the autonomous municipality of Suljaa ‘. Its members run Radio Ñomndaa – The Word of Water, under government harassment.
The indigenous live in a situation of structural poverty that is worsening daily. According to the National Council for the Evaluation of Social Development Policy (Coneval), 75.7 percent of Mexico’s indigenous population live in ‘multidimensional poverty’. Thirty-nine percent of that whole population live in ‘extreme multidimensional poverty’.
According to Coneval (some people criticize their measurements for being very conservative), people in ‘multidimensional poverty’ are those who suffer at least one form of social deprivation and lack enough income to meet their needs. Those categorised as in extreme poverty are people who cannot afford to eat.
The figures are dramatic. Nearly half of indigenous people lack basic education, 52.2 percent have no access to health services, 85.5 percent have no social security, 50.3 percent do not have a home with enough space or of adequate quality, 42.1 percent are hungry.
Neither the federal nor the state government are interested in improving this situation. State officials use resources designated for the indigenous as petty cash. In spite of this, the indigenous peoples struggle and resist. They are the ones who will have the last word on their status.
*******************************************************************
Dispute in Paradise
In southern Mexico ecotourism is developed at the expense of the indigenous population
Chiapas has distinguished itself in recent years as a popular holiday destination for Mexican and international tourists. Natural scenery and the ruins of the Classic Maya period are the main attractions in the southern Mexican state. It is little known that the promotion of tourism by the Chiapas government increasingly leads to conflicts in indigenous communities. The state takes advantage of this to enforce its economic interests.
The news attracted international attention: in a confrontation between indigenous small-scale farmers near the waterfalls of Agua Azul, a man was killed under still unclear circumstances, and many were injured. But the focus was on the 17 foreigners who were stranded because of the dispute for over 20 hours, and were later flown by helicopter to Palenque. Less attention was given to the 117 indigenous people who were arrested and taken to the police station to make their statements under threat of torture, and without the assistance of a translator. It is their land that gives access to the waterfalls, where the conflict had become inflamed and was now escalating.
This issue is not new, however. For several years, there has been at San Sebastián Bachajón, in the municipality of Chilón, a dispute between two groups over the ticket booth on the way to the waterfalls. Members of one group have for a few years been adherents to the Other Campaign, an anti-capitalist, pacifist initiative launched by the Zapatista Army of National Liberation (EZLN). They oppose the exploitation of the natural resources on their common land and position themselves against state-initiated plans for the expansion of ecotourism, about which they were not consulted and from which they expect more harm than good. The second group, called ‘oficialistas’ by their opponents because of their connection to the political parties, supports the government’s plans. They stand with the local representatives of the state government in the municipality of Chilón, who are driving the development of tourism. But it is also still a dispute about the revenue from the Other Campaign’s independent ticket booth, which was built next to the official ticket booth. According to unconfirmed information, in the second half of 2010 more than 400,000 pesos were taken in admission fees, which is of great interest to the government.
In April 2009, adherents to the Other Campaign became victims of repression from the state government of Juan Sabines Guerrero. Six Tzeltal indigenous were arrested in San Sebastián Bachajón accused of being involved in attacks on buses in the region around Agua Azul. Adherents to the Other Campaign then blocked the road between Palenque and Ocosingo, one of the main roads in the northeast of Chiapas, at the junction for the waterfalls. This was used as a pretext for a massive police operation in which the independent ticket booth was destroyed. To the state government this was just an eyesore, since they were not getting any revenue from it, and the adherents were declared opponents of the government. For weeks after, the police were stationed in the surrounding villages and at the intersection for Agua Azul. When they pulled back, the ticket booth was rebuilt by the adherents to the Other Campaign. The conflict within the community, however, was not resolved, as would be shown early in February 2011.
In the confrontation between the two groups on 2 February, the group of oficialistas forcibly took control of the ticket booth. The adherents to the Other Campaign tried to reclaim it. In this confrontation, there were casualties on both sides. A member of the oficialista group was so severely wounded by a shot that he succumbed to his injuries on the way to hospital. Consequently, the day after, 117 adherents to the Other Campaign were arrested; 107 were released on 5 February. The remaining ten were taken to the nearest prison, near Palenque, among them a minor and a man with learning difficulties. The Fray Bartolome de Las Casas Human Rights Centre (Frayba), which has taken on the defence of the ten men, said of the human rights violations in the context of their arrest, that “they had access neither to a lawyer nor a translator, also they were threatened by the police and intimidated by prosecution officials.”
The plans for the development of ecotourism in the region have dramatically increased the potential for local conflict. In early February 2010, there was a violent attack in the neighbouring community of Agua Azul, in which one of the attackers was accidentally shot by his own people. Some people from Agua Azul had occupied the farmland of the Zapatista community of Bolom Ajaw in order to use it to make a planned hotel project, located at the waterfalls, accessible. After the Zapatistas had tried unsuccessfully to persuade the squatters to retreat in a peaceful manner, there was a confrontation between the two groups. The Frayba Human Rights Centre, which has documented the case in detail, also explained the government’s plans for the region. Palenque is to become a “new Cancun”. The city with Mayan ruins is at the centre of a regional project for the development of tourism with the acronym CIP Palenque. The waterfalls of Agua Azul and Bolom Ajaw form an important part of the plan. Luxury lodges are planned there, charging between 500 and 1,000 U.S. dollars per night, not including the arrival by helicopter from Palenque.
As part of the promotion of tourism in Chiapas, it is also planned to develop the infrastructure of the state. This includes the construction of a motorway between the colonial town of San Cristobal de Las Casas and Palenque, which would almost exclusively go through indigenous villages. In the Tsotsil community of Mitzitón, 15 miles outside San Cristobal, the starting point of the highway was located and planned, stirring up resistance in some of the residents in 2009 when engineers with gauges suddenly showed up in the village. They joined the Other Campaign and made public their opposition to the project, which brought them solidarity from other groups in the movement initiated by the Zapatistas, but also meant an intercommunity conflict could erupt. For another part of the village spoke openly for the construction of the highway and began to interfere with the protest action of the adherents to the Other Campaign and attack them. The upshot was the sad death of a highway opponent in July 2009, as a group of advocates of the highway drove a truck at high speed into a group of opponents. The Chiapas government has now announced that the highway will not be built, apparently in deference to the protests. But unofficially there is also talk that the real reason for the lack of funding of the project by the federal government was Mexican law.
Although Mitzitón and San Sebastián Bachajón are more than 100 kilometres away from each other, the resistance against the government’s plans has brought together the organized groups in both villages. Their affiliation with the Other Campaign has encouraged this, if not made it possible. At various meetings of the pro-Zapatista movement they have had the opportunity to exchange ideas. And more than once, both groups have been in solidarity with each other in public, especially in protest actions, but also, as happened recently in San Sebastian Bachajón, in cases of state repression.
The Chiapas government reacted to the confrontation at Agua Azul on 2 February with a media campaign to present itself as a conciliator. In paid newspaper advertisements, including one in the largest Mexican daily of the left, La Jornada, they reported a roundtable discussion between the residents of Agua Azul and San Sebastián Bachajón at which the Governor Juan Sabines Guerrero had gathered to witness the dialogue. As a solution to the conflict, the model of a single ticket booth was presented, to be led by the Chiapas Ministry of Economy. A small “flaw”, however, was that the group from the Other Campaign, which is involved in the conflict, was not involved in the dialogue. They were already excluded from negotiations with the government after the oficialistas had forcibly taken the ticket booth from them.
The Network for Peace, a coalition of local human rights organizations, made it clear in a statement about the events that dialogue previously initiated by the parties was destroyed by the action of the government. The government had initially authorized the forcible occupation of the independent ticket booth, the repression and the release of the prisoners subject to their approval of the conditions imposed by the government. In a statement from the ten prisoners at the end of February it was explained that they were pressurised by government officials in prison, “to accept their proposals for dialogue”, in order to secure their release in return.
One day before the violent confrontation at Agua Azul, President Felipe Calderón was on a private visit to the region in order to promote the “Year of Tourism” in Chiapas. Whether there is a connection between his trip and the incident remains unclear, but cannot be completely excluded. If the Mexican and Chiapas governments insist on a strategy of strengthening tourism at the expense of conflicts in indigenous communities, the media reports themselves in early February about the 17 stranded international tourists might be seen as counterproductive and make Chiapas unattractive as a holiday destination.
********************************************************************
Urgent Action for San Sebastián Bachajón, Chiapas
Fray Bartolome de las Casas Human Rights Centre
San Cristobal de Las Casas, Chiapas
February 7, 2011
Arbitrary Deprivation of Liberty of ejidatarios in Chiapas
State government has detained 10 ejidatarios, adherents to the Other Campaign from San Sebastián Bachajón .
On 3rd February 117 ejidatarios, indigenous Tzeltales from San Sebastián Bachajón, municipality of Chilon, Chiapas, were arbitrarily detained; the detainees, adherents to the Other Campaign (hereafter OC), said that among the irregularities in the legal process they did not have legal counsel or a qualified interpreter, they were also threatened by state police and and harassed by prosecutors.
According to information in the hands of the Human Rights Centre, the arrest of the ejidatarios occurred while they were attending a meeting above the entrance to the waterfalls of Agua Azul, in order to agree the response they would give the state government concerning their offer to start a dialogue between the parties; this was when the state police made the mass arrests, pursuing those who sought refuge in the homes of locals.
The next day, February 4, the interrogation and the collection of evidence began, they were made to take the sodium rhodizonate test (translator’s note: this is a test for gunshot {lead} residue) and were forced to give urine samples for toxicology testing; during this whole process they reported that they were at no time assisted by a lawyer, nor helped by interpreters qualified in their language and culture. Their statements say that during the taking of their statements, they received threats from the state police and harassment from the civil servants responsible for the administration of justice.
According to records obtained, at approximately 02:00 hours on the 5th of February, the Attorney General of the State of Chiapas released 107 of theejidatarios and later, at 20:00 hours on the same day, 10 people, including aminor, were sent to the Criminal Court at Playas de Catazajá and transferred to the National Centre for Social Reinsertion of the Sentenced, No. 17 (CERSS No. 17) in the municipality of Playas de Catazajá, Chiapas, on charges of qualified homicide, attempted murder, breach of the peace and and attacks on the physical integrity and heritage of the State, under the criminal case No. 39/2011.
The ejidatarios of San Sebastián Bachajón, adherents of the OC, who are still being held are:
Demeza Mariano Silvano (minor, 17 years old)
Alvaro Domingo Pérez (part of the Comisión de promoción)
Pedro Hernández López (secretary of the ejidal commission)
Miguel Lopez Deara (deputy of the ejidal council)
Domingo García Gómez (member of the Rights Defence Committee)
Juan Aguilar Guzman (chief treasurer)
Pedro García Álvaro (mentally handicapped)
Jerónimo Méndez Guzmán (ejidatario)
Pedro López Gómez (ejidatario)
On the 6th February, the Chiapas state government publicly announced the start of a dialogue between the parties; however, the ejidatarios, adherents of the OC, did not attend because the proposal did not respect the fact that that there already was a process of dialogue in place, aimed at reaching an agreement within the community; they also indicated that they had been violently assaulted and evicted from the toll booth (for the Agua Azul waterfalls) by the group of ‘official ejidatarios‘; that the state government holds 10 ejidatarios in prison and the police force now occupies the territory held that historically belong to them (the ejidatarios).
Given these facts, the Human Rights Centre believes that their right to personal integrity, right to the presumption of innocence, right to due process, judicial guarantees and judicial protection have all been violated.
Because the legal period expires on Friday 11 February, we urge the national and international community to demand:
– the guarantee of the human rights of the detainees, particularly the rights to the presumption of innocence, to a fair trial and to judicial protection and respect for due process.
We ask groups, organizations and individuals to engage in acts of solidarity in support of the detainees and of respect for the territory of indigenous peoples.
We ask you to send demands for urgent action.
The government’s plans for tourism in Chiapas, and the implications for indigenous peoples and the environment. Feb 2010.
On the 22nd of every month, the group Las Abejas commemorate the Acteal massacre. In their press release for 22nd February, they commented:
“‘What was the reason for the Acteal massacre?’ they ask. What happened in Acteal was designed to send a clear message: that of terror and death for those people who defend their land from neoliberal projects, and who demand respect for their human rights, especially indigenous rights. The conflicts in Agua Azul and Mitziton are the product of economic interests. Agua Azul is a rich area; but if there are people living there, it’s difficult for the government to build a tourist centre without having noise and obstacles in their way. That’s why it’s convenient for the Sabines government to make problems in these zones, so that people become divided and don’t have the strength to organize themselves against the construction of the tourist centre and the San Cristobal – Palenque highway.”
In order to understand events such as the attacks by alleged paramilitary groups in Bolom Ajaw, near Agua Azul, and Mitziton, situated near the start of the proposed new super-highway, and the recent evictions of communities in the Montes Azules biosphere reserve, it is necessary to consider the planned tourist developments for Chiapas. The development strategy for this plan was drawn up, for the federal government of the state of Chiapas, by Norton Consulting Inc. and EDSA, both based in Florida, USA. Norton Consulting describe themselves as ‘real estate and resort specialists’, and photos of the pristine turquoise waters of Agua Azul feature on the front page of their website. EDSA are landscape architects and urban designers who specialise in planning ‘the client’s vision’.
These consultants say the strategy is designed to ‘identify specific projects for development, which can elevate the tourism on offer and create a more vibrant tourist economy’. Eight ‘tourist circuits’ are to be promoted, within the ‘Jungle (selva) region of Chiapas’, focusing on Plan CIP Palenque (the integrally planned centre of Palenque). This will provide ‘a gateway to the Maya world’, Mexico’s ‘new window of tourism’. The jewel in the crown of this gateway and window will be the CIP tourist corridor from Palenque to Agua Azul, which will offer something different, as ‘it will not be a beach destination’.
The development strategy, which allocates 400 million pesos for the purchase of land in this area, and 100 million for the communication links between Palenque and the Agua Azul waterfalls, identifies the first actions needed. The improvements in access by land and air are already underway, but
“The state and local government must ensure that the tourists who visit Chiapas and Palenque feel safe and protected. The Zapatista movement is still strongly associated with Chiapas, but not with Palenque. The state should consider focusing the name of the project on Palenque….as Chiapas is still considered unsafe by many who are not familiar with the region”.
Four ‘ideal locations’ have been identified in the priority area, the only difficulty being the ‘ownership and control’ of the land which means that ‘the state may need to acquire additional land’. The ‘concept’ involves:
Concept 1: ‘a world class boutique hotel’, cost 15 to 20 million US dollars, 60 – 75 rooms.
Concept 2: lodge ‘retreat’ near the waterfalls of Agua Azul, cost 2 to 4 million US dollars, 10 – 20 rooms
Concept 3: 5 star European style hotel, cost 20 to 25 million US dollars, 200 – 250 rooms
Concept 4: hotel development , including a conference centre and 18 hole golf course, cost 25 to 35 million US dollars, 250 rooms
The government’s priority is Concept 2. “The waterfalls of Agua Azul represent a world class attraction which could become one of the visitor’s most memorable experiences. We believe that offering the operator of the Boutique Hotel the opportunity for their guests to live the waterfall experience could enrich their investment opportunity. We therefore assume that an appropriate site with a view of the falls could be acquired by the state”.
“As access to the site is so difficult at the moment, we would recommend that tourists arrive by helicopter or seaplane. The combined experience of arriving and viewing the waterfalls would make the Waterfall Lodge ‘Retreat’ resort ‘one of the most special experiences in the western hemisphere’.
There will also be a restaurant and bar with a view of the falls, an illuminated helicopter landing strip ‘which will be transformed at night into a ‘platform for astrology’, and ‘zip-lines’ for travelling between the hotel and the quay. The quay will be for boat trips on the river, and will also have a bar. Phase 1 will involve 20 accommodation units, and phase 2 an additional 20. These will be ‘rustic bungalows’ designed to ‘highlight the connection with nature by having outside showers and air conditioning only in the bedrooms’. During the rainy season, the lodge would be closed ‘as the colour of the waters is brown’.
However, “before attracting investment, the state must solve the problems of acquiring land and of access. The acquisition of land next to the cascades is vital for the preservation of the views and natural corridors, so that these views can remain unspoiled and picturesque”.
In other words, the only obstacle to this dream investment opportunity, which is to be offered to multinational corporations such as the Orient Express, the Luxury Collection, and the Aman group, the only problem delaying the development of the ‘gateway to the Maya world’, is the Maya themselves, who insist on their right to their traditional lands, and on protecting the natural environment. Long-term followers of the Zapatistas may be reminded of the memo from Chase Manhattan Bank in January 1995, which was followed by a military crackdown on the Zapatista movement: “While Chiapas, in our opinion, does not pose a fundamental threat to Mexican political stability, it is perceived to be so by many in the investment community. The government will need to eliminate the Zapatistas in order to demonstrate their effective control of the national territory and of security policy.”
On the 21st February 2010, the government of Chiapas responded to a letter from lawyers and academics denouncing the recent aggressions against the Zapatistas at Bolom Ajaw near Agua Azul. In their response, they asserted that their intention was to “return the jungle to its original inhabitants, the flora and fauna”.
Jose Pascual Rubio Cano, secretary for International Relations for the Spanish CGT, responded with outrage and astonishment on behalf of the union: “Such an assertion shows once again the contempt felt by the government of Chiapas towards its original peoples, who are the natural and ancestral guardians of the land, territory, flora and fauna and who today, as always, challenge and oppose the devastation inflicted by multinational corporations in the name of ecotourism and capitalist economic development.
“The flora and fauna cannot survive the capitalist depredation on their own… It is the indigenous people who practice a fair and just use of natural resources, based on respect and balance, since they view the earth as the source of life, while the Chiapas government and the multinationals view it as a source of income. It is not only necessary to respect the flora and fauna, it is also necessary to respect the people who live in these lands and the use these people wish to make of their habitat……
“Sr. Sabines Guerrero, the policies of your government are to wipe out the roots of the indigenous communities and their material, community and spiritual ways of life, using illegal and illegitimate deceptions, such as your recent ‘law for indigenous rights in Chiapas’, or ‘Sabines law’, through which you are trying to legalise the avaricious destruction of indigenous communities. The main aim of your government is none other than to destroy the Zapatista autonomous organisation and its army, the EZLN, which is the main focus of resistance to your mercantile plans……We demand that you respect the rights of native peoples laid out in national and international agreements such as ILO 169, and the San Andres Accords”.
NOTES
1. The sources of the report quoted are FONATUR, March 2008 and the Secretary of Tourism and International Relations of the Chiapas government. They have been made available in Spanish by Frayba. http://www.slideshare.net/pliegoelbuenas/100217-informe-bolom-ajaw-anexo-1-1-1-3218096
Some areas of text have been highlighted for emphasis.
2. Bolom Ajaw is a Zapatista community located very close to the Agua Azul waterfalls, and with another spectacular but so far undeveloped waterfall on its lands. It has a long history of violence and provocation by PRI members from the Agua Azul community, who belong to OPDDIC, an alleged paramilitary group. The conflict is about the control of the land and of the entry fee for tourists, and the most recent outbreak was on February 6th this year, when one person was killed, and a number injured. There is now an intense military presence in the zone with constant patrols and helicopter overflights. The JBG of Morelia has made a proposal for dialogue, but the government is insisting that this take place in the Government palace in Tuxtla in the presence of governor Sabines. If a Zapatista representative could not attend, this could provide a pretext for an invasion by the Mexican army.
******************************************************************************
THE GROWTH OF EVANGELICAL PARAMILITARY ACTIVITY IN CHIAPAS August 2009
Twenty of the paramilitaries who were among the material authors of the Acteal Massacre in 1997 were released from prison on 12th August 2009, and the cases of 37 more are under review. A week later, documents were declassified which prove that the Mexican government and its army authorized the paramilitary activity in Chiapas which led to the massacre. The Acteal massacre was, therefore, un crimen de estado (a state crime) perpetrated by the government of President Ernesto Zedillo. The message sent, that of impunity for atrocity, has encouraged the growing presence of armed paramilitary groups already active in the area. The men are members of the Army of God, an evangelical group. Violence is increasing and tension is high.
Twenty Acteal assassins released
“If they free the paramilitaries, they’ll come back to kill us”.
In Acteal, the oldest of the old say that those who die with their eyes open will always come back to point out their assassins….
Las Abejas, the Bees, are a grassroots Catholic pacifist organization of honey-gatherers and coffee growers, who support the Zapatistas’ aims and demands, but as a non-violent group, would not take up arms. They fled their homes in 1997 after repeated attacks from groups of armed evangelical supporters of the PRI, and took refuge at the Zapatista community of Acteal. On 22nd December 1997, they were gathered at the Catholic church praying for peace, when they were attacked by a group of armed men. The shooting continued all day, as the attackers scoured the hillside to ensure no one had escaped, while forty police officers in the nearby schoolhouse did nothing. Fifteen children, twenty-one women and nine men were slain that day, and four unborn babies ripped from their mothers’ wombs: “we must destroy the seed”. Both the killers and the killed were indigenous Tzotziles.. No senior official of a municipal, state or federal authority,or member of the army, has ever been held to account, and the intellectual authors of the massacre continue to evade justice. Fifty-seven Tzotziles were eventually imprisoned, members of the local community, well-known to the victims and survivors. On 13 August, twenty of these material authors of the massacre were released on the grounds, not of innocence, but of procedural errors in their prosecutions. A judicial decision on the appeals of over thirty other prisoners is expected imminently. The Frayba Centre calls this release ‘a crime against humanity’. There are now very real fears that the freed killers will take revenge against the survivors. In effect it gives impunity to paramilitary groups. A complete mockery has been made of the whole Mexican justice system.
Fear and tension Tension is now extremely high in the highlands area, and army and police patrols have increased. The president of Las Abejas has reported that the paramilitary groups are reorganizing and that EZLN insurgents are deploying throughout the mountains.
Comments from Amnesty International
“This is yet another example of the serious deficiencies of the Mexican justice system, which seems to be incapable of investigating, prosecuting and punishing through a fair trial those responsible for human rights violations,” said Rupert Knox, Mexico researcher at Amnesty International. “The Mexican authorities must begin a new independent investigation into the Acteal massacre in order to ensure that all those responsible are brought to justice. Without justice, the authorities are condemning the community to the danger of more violence.”
Documents prove government links with paramilitary groups
Newly declassified US documents, released a week after the freeing of the prisoners, confirm that Presidents Salinas and Zedillo, through the Mexican army, promoted and encouraged the development of paramilitary groups in Chiapas since mid-1994. This was as part of a comprehensive counterinsurgency operation against Zapatista support bases that included arming and training, co-ordination of intelligence, and protection from local authorities. The documents show that paramilitary groups, including those that participated in the Acteal massacre, were under the direct supervision of army intelligence agencies. The magazine Proceso has published the names of those responsible for the counterinsurgency, calling them ‘the contras of Chiapas’ At the request of the Pentagon, the Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA) confirmed that paramilitary groups “were under the supervision of Mexican military intelligence during the time the massacre in Acteal took place, with Ernesto Zedillo holding the position of Executive” and in possession of “presidential authority”. Kate Doyle, Director of the Mexican Project at the National Security Archive, says these documents clearly contradict the official history of the Acteal massacre, which presented it as the result of an inter-community conflict. Ernesto Zedillo, supreme intellectual author of the massacre, is now Director of Yale University’s Centre for Globalisation Studies.
The Mesoamerica Project and the new super-highway
The new Palenque Integrally Planned Highway being built from San Cristobal de Las Casas to Palenque is the latest phase of the Mesoamerica Project, formerly known as the Plan Puebla Panama. This plan is designed to develop infrastructure to allow a dramatic expansion of trade, tourism, and multi-national corporate exploitation and plunder. The plan includes ports, airports, dams, bridges and roads. Central to this development in Chiapas are plans for the new Palenque Integral Centre (CIP), a massive tourist development to be located between the Agua Azul waterfalls and the ruins of Palenque, with hotels, restaurants, spas, travel agencies and a ‘theme park’. Construction of the 174 km road has now started near Rancho Nuevo military base. While the government remains secretive about the exact route of the new highway, the route will cut through indigenous territory, occupied by communities in resistance, members of the Other Campaign and Zapatista support bases, “opposed to sacrificing their lands on the altar of tourism”. This has already led to confrontations. The road-building will also destroy areas of cloud forest, and for 70 km pass through the Mesoamerican Biological Corridor.
The use of paramilitaries to facilitate building the road
In the area of the planned Palenque Integral Centre, it is reported that the state and federal police are actively supporting, arming, and training a group called OPDDIC, the Organization for the Defense of Indigenous and Campesino Rights, with the aim of driving out, or repressing into submission, the indigenous communities opposed to losing their lands and homes. OPDDIC members report to the police that Other Campaign members or Zapatista support bases have committed crimes, and the police detain and torture these people under the protection of the army. The crimes, such as highway robbery, have often been committed by the OPDDIC members. In the community of Jotola, the inhabitants say the OPDDIC members are guilty of “narcotics trafficking, murder and the theft of horses”.
Members of the Regional Association of Coffee Growers of Ocosingo (ORCAO) have been harassing the community of Bosque Bonito in the autonomous municipality 17 de Noviembre, attacking them and selling their lands.
Evangelical paramilitaries in Mitzitón
The new highway is designated to start in, and run through the middle of, the community of Mitzitón, in the rural part of San Cristóbal de las Casas municipality . The majority of ejido members belong to the Other Campaign, and are in resistance to the road. A group of heavily armed evangelicals in the community, the no cooperantes, who already have a reputation for people trafficking, are in favour of the road. They support, and are supported by, the PRD state government. On July 21, many witnesses report thet Aurelio Díaz Hernández was run over and killed by a truck driven by a member of this evangelical group, while demonstrating against the new highway. At least 5 other members of the Other Campaign were injured at the same time.
Alas de Águila 2000 (Wings of the Eagle) and el Ejército de Dios (the Army of God), are evangelical groups organized on paramilitary lines, who claim as members the paramilitaries who committed the Acteal massacre. The defence of these paramilitaries was organized by the religious leaders of these groups under the government-funded Centre for Economic Research and Teaching (CIDE). Again through CIDE, they and their commander-in-chief, Esdras Alonso, are suing the Fray Bartolomé Human Rights Centre, community leaders in Mitzitón, and Hermann Bellinghausen from La Jornada, for defamation of character (calling them paramilitaries). In recent weeks the Army of God has become much more visible in the streets of San Cristobal, marching in military formation and military uniform, with military officers, demonstrating their force and power.
“The non-cooperating army of god, that killed our comrade, arrived with a truck full of migrant brothers. We want to prevent further smuggling in our territory, to make sure none of the people of our community will be run over or attacked again.”
Indigenous communities campaign together against the new road
A six-hour roadblock was held by over a thousand Other Campaign adherents in support of their demands for the cessation of the planned highway in August 2009. This was followed by a press conference held by followers of the Other Campaign representing three communities seriously affected by the construction of the San Cristobal-Palenque highway: Mitzitón, Jotolá and San Sebastián Bachajón. Representatives denounced the current situation, saying they are faced with “bad neoliberal projects that offer no benefit to indigenous people in any way” and the plundering of their land which “threatens our very presence on it”.
Other Campaign members from Mitzitón condemned the fact that after a month there has been no arrest made in the murder case of Aurelio Diaz Hernandez. They also reported that paramilitaries continue to “threaten with their guns, firing them often into the air during the evening and night” and that public officials from the Ministry of Communication and Transportation have made new attempts to “trick us into signing a meeting certificate to give them permission to pass through our territory to build the highway to Palenque.” Members of the Other Campaign in San Sebastián Bachajón demanded the “immediate release” of political prisoners Geronimo Gomez Saragos and Antonio Gomez Saragos, who were arrested in April. They also demanded that arrest warrants for another four people be withdrawn. They reported the recent “illegal occupation of their land by state and federal police” and said members of the Other Campaign have been threatened by OPDDIC.
The Jotolá communal landowners have received similar threats and said OPDDIC members are “firing their guns, scaring our families and our children.”
In conclusion, the representatives of the three communities explained that they had met on this occasion to defend their land, their rights and their indigenous culture that “the bad government wants to destroy and continue destroying like they did with our ancestors.”
“We’ve become a country of assassinations, massacres and genocides without culpability, a country of innocents, a country of irresponsible people who go through life without being accountable to anyone, a nation mired in impunity.” Jorge Camil.
******************************************************************************
THE CURRENT SITUATION IN CHIAPAS MAY 2009
Once again the indigenous peoples of Chiapas are cast in the rôle of defenders of the land, the environment, and natural resources against the predations of the neo-liberal system.
In the beautiful green valleys of the rivers Agua Azul, Bascán, Tulijá and Misol-há, conflicts and violence continue to erupt in response to proposed ‘eco-tourism’ developments, the income from tourism, and the planned new highway between San Cristóbal de Las Casas and Palenque.
A national and international call for action has gone out for people to take action in support of 7 political prisoners. These men are Other Campaign adherents from the community of San Sebastián Bachajón, which is situated near the waterfalls at Agua Azul, and have been imprisoned unjustly since the 16th of April.
The Fray Bartolomé de Las Casas Human Rights Centre has confirmed, in many statements, that these men have been imprisoned on false charges following being forced to sign documents they could not understand (they are Tzeltal speakers, and were not given access to an interpreter). The NGO further confirms that the 7 prisoners have been beaten, tortured, and forced to work continually without rest even though several of them are injured. The 30th of May 2009 has been chosen as the Day of Action in support of these prisoners.
The charges on which they have been unjustly imprisoned are those of robbery with violence on the road to the waterfalls, and organised crime. In reality, their imprisonment is on account of their opposition to the Palenque Integrally Planned Highway which will cross their lands, and the 7 men were active in trying to prevent highway robbery in the area. The JBG of Morelia has named the real perpetrators of these attacks, members of the PRI-supporting paramilitary group OPDDIC, and has arrested two of them. This group, which is closely linked to the state police, has been especially active in the region for the last two years. One of the imprisoned men declared “We in the Other Campaign have organised to defend our land and natural resources from these neo-liberal economic projects, and to detain, according to our customs and traditions, those who engage in attacking people on the road which crosses our community.”
Originally there were eight prisoners. One, a base of support of the EZLN, has since been released, without any explanation or apology. Amnesty International has expressed ‘serious concern’, as has the World Organisation against Torture who denounced the ‘serious repression’.
In addition to inventing crimes, the Chiapas authorities are operating a concerted media campaign to discredit the prisoners, particularly through the government-controlled TV channel, Channel 10.
The JBG has further denounced this situation as part of a larger counter-insurgency campaign, consisting of hostile actions – burnings, shootings, threats, violence, towards the different autonomous municipalities. A gravel quarry, and the booth for collecting entry payments for the waterfalls have been ‘recuperated’ and given to OPDDIC who now benefit from all the tourist income, and will be able to sell the gravel for the building of the new highway.
The road through the area is now under the control of the state police (Highway and Preventive divisions). They have turned the area into a ‘rat’s nest’ – with assaults, intimidation, arms and drug traffic, crimes and aggressions. Anyone who opposes the tourism developments and the building of the new road is persecuted, threatened and attacked. The police operate continuous patrols.
A nearby area with similar problems is Agua Clara, but the situation at the waterfalls of Misol-há is markedly different, perhaps because they is not directly situated on the Palenque Integrally Planned Highway. Here a harmonious agreement has been reached between all political and religious groups, celebrated with a great fiesta in April.
Elsewhere in Chiapas, resistance to the new highway is also under way, as is a vicious response to this resistance. The development will open up the whole area to more foreign investment, and result in whole communities losing their homes, lands and livelihoods. In Mitziton, near Teopisca, the community has rejected the highway “it will only benefit the rich”. In response to this decision ‘a whole wave of aggressions’ has been launched, including attempts to take away their land.
The Autonomous Regional Council of the Coastal Zone of Chiapas, declaring their support for the prisoners, said “They want to shut us up by putting us in prison, but we’re not going to stop because the campaign has hardly started”. But neither, it seems, has the state response.
A related problem, also in the state of Chiapas, among many parts of Latin America, is the continuing depredations by foreign mining companies in search of ‘precious metals’. In Chicomuselo in the Sierra Madre de Chiapas, Blackfire Exploration and Linear Gold are conducting aggressive mining operations, destroying the land, stealing the water, and contaminating and polluting everything they touch, with grave consequences for the health of the local population.
An unknown quantity in areas of dire poverty is epidemics. While AH1N1 was very convenient for governments, at the time they chose to release information about it, when the indigenous die their deaths are not even counted. They appear on no lists. Their lives and deaths are not taken into account. Enduring a scandalous lack of hygiene, services, infrastructure, washing facilities or safe water they die, as always, in silence.
The call from adherents to the Sexta in San Cristobal for us to raise our voices against state repression in Chiapas states:
“ If we allow this process to continue in silence, we, the national and international community, will leave open the possibility for this government to continue their crimes; allowing repression to continue against social activists; giving permission to torture, intimidate, and detain anyone that defends their legitimate right to live without fear and demand their basic human rights; we will allow them to continue to develop massive projects that will lead to the destruction of a dignified life for any human being.”
The FPDT (people’s front for the defence of the land) in Atenco wrote to the EZLN:
“We also know that you are still fighting a low intensity war against the bad government. We know the situation you’re experiencing is a war that’s less and less covert all the time, a war made up of confrontations with diverse forces, of efforts to wear you down and hit you again and again. On one front or another, the government is trying to undermine your resistance, to do away with one of the most important social processes in Mexico and the world…….. We know that for the EZLN, aggression is always latent because you’ve built a counter power capable of confronting the State, that your process is a highly important effort in building democracy from the ground up, and that a blow against you would be a victory for political and economic power, not only in our country, but in the world. And so we say to you that we are with you, that the Zapatista struggle is our struggle and that in so far as possible, to the best of our ability, we’re with you, brothers and sisters.”
***************
***********************************************************************
¡Juan Vázquez Guzmán Vive! ¡La Lucha de Bachajón Sigue! 